


The Twins of Light and Darkness

by anfeltyz



Series: The Twins of Light and Darkness [1]
Category: Shall We Date?: Obey Me!
Genre: "Twincest" but they're a symbiotic entity so maybe it's masturbation?, Best Friends, Breeding, Competition, Complicated Relationships, Dreamsharing, Dubious Consent, Dysfunctional Relationships, Eventual Smut, F/M, Game Dialogue to be Sprinkled In, Jealousy, Love Triangle, Loving relationships, M/M, Magic, Mammon is a stubborn idiot, Minor Vore, Multi, Mutual Pining, Negotiations, Politics, Polyamory, Power Dynamics, Reverse Harem, Sharing a Bed, Slow Build, Supportive Relationships, This is not a Point A to Point B story. Expect many stops on this trip., Wooing, desensitization therapy, sensory modulation therapy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:29:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 119
Words: 329,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22729183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anfeltyz/pseuds/anfeltyz
Summary: MC interrupts a "disagreement" between Belphegor and Beelzebub and neither are willing to talk about it. That one instance kicks off more chaos than MC may be up for.Learning about pacts. Growing and healing together with interference, insurrections, and many shenanigans.Updates on Monday mornings.P.S. I encourage you to leave your fan theories in the comments section <3P.P.S. I only add the twincest warning for people who see B&B as related or "raised" together. To me, they're one symbiotic entity that can't survive without the other half.
Relationships: Asmodeus/Main Character (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!), Beelzebub/Belphegor (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!)/Original Character(s), Beelzebub/Belphegor (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!)/Reader, Belphegor/Main Character (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!), Leviathan/Main Character (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!), Lucifer/Main Character (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!), Main Character/Mammon (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!), Main Character/Satan (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!)
Series: The Twins of Light and Darkness [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1977916
Comments: 2235
Kudos: 1776





	1. It's Just a Little Struggle Snuggle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day 41 of the Devildom Calendar - Friday, February 10th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for looking over the edits I made to these early chapters.

Having adapted fairly well to being abducted and becoming an “exchange student,” the only thing worth frowning at today was the standard issue D.D.D. that buzzed to life, vibrating its way across her dresser. She needed to finish getting ready to head back out and didn’t want to keep Beelzebub waiting for their newest restaurant expedition.

She knew he likely only invited her along to make sure he didn’t eat the plates, but it was nice to have his unassuming company, and human-edible appetizers always seemed to make their way over to her during their restaurant crawls. Even if she’d wanted to decline his invitation, it would be impossible. The face he made when he was disappointed reminded her of the confused hurt puppies showed when scolded.

‘This better not be Mammon,’ she thought, catching her D.D.D. as if fell from its perch. Her greedy demon couldn’t be broke already, could he? He’d only just gotten paid half an hour ago; at this time of day he should still be slowly counting his money. 

Turning the device over, she was surprised to find Belphegor’s picture staring back at her. Weird. Maybe he wanted to tag along? No, that was unlikely; he was clingy, yes, but far too lazy to call her. He would've just asked Beelzebub, who should be in their shared bedroom swapping his RAD uniform for something more comfortable to eat in.

Unlocking the device quickly, she answered, but her repeated “hellos” received no reply. Only the rustling of fabric, some thumping, and a few gasps greeted her. She glanced furtively around her room. Was this a dirty phone call? 

Belphegor didn’t really seem like the type. At least, not the type to say nothing. His tongue was sharp and he always had something biting at the ready. It only seemed fair that he would be equally eloquent at talking dirty. She shook her head at that train of thought. Napping with the Avatar of Sloth was still a fairly new activity, but it was obvious he had just pocket dialed her. He was handsome and she was letting her thoughts run away wild where they had no right traipsing.

“Just give up, Beel!” she heard clearly through the speaker, and then a loud crash.

Giving up on her outing preparations, she marched down to the twins’ shared bedroom, knocking loudly on the door. “What the Devildom is going on in there?” Knowing her demons, she was going to miss out on her not-a-date-outing if she didn’t investigate. Those two would demolish a wall and somehow, her included, they’d all be on Lucifer’s shit list.

There was no response to her knocking except for more crashing. “Well, Mammon always says not locking your door means you’re asking for someone to come in.” With a turn of the doorknob, she swung open the door forcefully, and there they were, thrashing on the floor between their beds in full demon forms. 

Umbrellas had gone flying, pictures were askew, even the chest at the end of Belphegor’s bed had been pushed across the floor at one point. Carefully, she stepped over the chest and into the room. She could feel their magic lapping against her like ripples in a pond, which meant this wasn’t the usual horseplay. It was rare enough for Belphegor to find the energy for walking much less grappling.

Eyeing the pillow lodged in the wall, she licked her lips, suddenly a little uncertain about trying to break them up if either of them could make meteorites out of fluffy things the way Lucifer could. She cleared her throat while they continued to wrestle back and forth across the blue carpet.

“Drop out, Beel,” she heard Belphegor growl out from underneath Beelzebub’s large frame. Belphegor was choking him from behind while being crushed under his twin’s weight.

Beelzebub gave a gurgling negative and shifted his weight into his shoulders, clearly intent on squishing Belphegor.

Perplexed observation had become second nature to her now, but eventually enough was enough and she would shake off the absurdity of whatever was in front of her and act. They may be demons, and could likely rough house like this without issue, but they were still comrades, they even called one another brother. These two even shared feelings which meant that sometimes they were the hardest creatures in the Devildom to get to make up. She’d have to break them up soon if they didn’t relent on their own.

It was impressive that Belphegor had managed to hold on this long. She watched as he immobilized Beelzebub’s free arm and continued to tighten the lock around his neck. He really did look like a sloth with his arms and legs wrapped around Beelzebub: Belphegor with his giant Beel-branch. But at this point, Belphegor had to be getting crushed at least as much as Beelzebub was being choked.

There was a muffled “never!” from Beelzebub as he rocked from side to side. 

She watched as he tried to flex his wings with Belphegor squishing them tightly between them to keep from getting cut by their edges. “Gentlemen,” she said loudly, waggling her lit D.D.D. screen at them, “someone has summoned me to watch you writhe on the floor together.”

They both froze. She could see that the choke hold on Beelzebub had loosened somewhat, as his face was no longer purpling at such an alarming rate, and, presumably, when the rocking had stopped, Belphegor was also no longer being squished as severely as before.

A particularly nasty grumble from beneath Beelzebub kicked them off again. She sighed, tapping her foot impatiently. Thankfully, it seemed her acknowledged presence was bringing the scuffle slowly to an end. Beelzebub squeezed his legs around Belphegor’s crossed ankles and flipped them both over onto their sides.

The pain apparent in Belphegor’s face put her in motion: she dropped her D.D.D., making directly for them. The way Belphegor jerked was like watching a jetpack that wanted to fly away while still held on by a single strap. It was surprising that his struggle to escape didn't cause more strain on Beelzebub. He only grunted and flexed his legs more tightly. 

“That’s quite enough,” she said, wedging her hands between them. How they managed to continue trying to squeeze the life out of one another while still allowing her to pull them apart was a mystery. Stepping into the hole she had made between wings and stomach, she eyed them both sternly. “If you don’t let go of one another right now, you **will** injure me,” she said.

They sprung apart, breathing hard, each rolling toward their own side of the room, only to sit up and glare at one another.

She walked back to collect her D.D.D. from where she had dropped it, ending the call and slipping it into the hidden pocket within the fills of her skirt. “Now, what on Earth is going on here?” she asked, the question tipping hazardously close to incredulous territory. “It’s pretty clear to me that you two weren’t playing around.” They were usually so close.

Neither of them would look at her, instead trying to covertly duel with dirty looks around her.

Sighing never got her anywhere in this house; she could sigh enough to sail a ship and it wouldn’t flutter an eyelash here. She breathed in slowly and exhaled just as slowly instead while trying to puzzle them out. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to sit here and starve to death then, because I’m not moving until you two find a way to make up.” Strategically choosing a spot directly between them, she down down and blocked their view of one another.

The dirty looks narrowed in on her, even if they weren’t of the same caliber as before.

“It was just a...struggle snuggle,” said Belphegor, completely deadpan.

Beelzebub nodded along, trying to force a smile. “Nothing to worry over.”

She said nothing, but blinked slowly at Belphegor, before looking away from him to try and process that one. "I should hope not," she said, her look of confusion and disgust clear. Did that mean something different to demons?

They may be as old as dirt but they were about as mature as twelve year-olds some days. She wouldn’t put it past him to just be messing with her. Maybe it was an idiom among sloth demons?

Laying herself down on their carpet, she ignored them both in favour of fishing out her D.D.D and holding it above herself to scroll through the latest Devilgrams. Looking over Leviathan’s new strategy guide for Mononoke Land wouldn’t be a bad idea while she waited. In fact, now would be the perfect time to order the next programming course for him. She probably had just long enough for both.The twins would crack before her stomach had a chance to growl.

From Beelzebub’s side of the room, her name floated over to her. He sounded remorseful and uncertain already.

“Yeeees?” she answered, her eyes still not leaving her screen. She wasn’t going to let his sad pout distract her.

“You can’t _not_ eat.”

She heard his stomach grumble from only imagining her not eating. “Sure I can,” she said, unperturbed. “It only takes humans up to three weeks to die of starvation, three to four days if I don’t drink any water.” She lowered the D.D.D. slightly, looking past it to think. “If I don’t sleep, I could probably cut that down to two days.”

“You can’t be _that_ motivated to break up our disagreement,” Belphegor said, mocking her gamble. She could practically hear the eye roll that accompanied his words. 

“Oh yes, I can,” she said, and went back to ignoring them.

“Don’t be ridiculous. Lucifer will force feed you if he has to, to keep you alive for the rest of the year,” Belphegor said, but he didn’t spit the words as she'd expected. He seemed sulky.

It was still a win. Even if they were only talking to her, and not one another, it meant she was halfway to victory. “I’m sure that would go over swimmingly with Diavolo,” she said, nearly singing it with her amusement. “Besides, you know I have enough willpower to outlive Lucifer’s anger; it would only take me two days of willpower to die.” Standing up to Lucifer twice was more than enough for her but they didn’t need to know that.

Beelzebub was at her side now, crawling to her on his knees so that he partially blocked out the light from the ceiling above. “Come on, ” he said, pressing a hand against her shoulder and gently jostling her attention away from her screen. “I’ll give this victory to you. You win.”

With his forehead all scrunched up he looked pained, and she lowered her D.D.D. to glance over at Belphegor, his arms still crossed stubbornly across his chest. ‘Not quite yet,’ she thought, and sent him her saddest puppy eyes, focusing on him and his cute blush intently. 

Maybe it wasn't a blush, just heat from their tussle, but the part of her mind that had imagined a dirty phone call now supplied that it looked good on him, something to be re-created with other activities.

Still sullen, Belphegor reverted from his demonic appearance and back into his casual clothing, but the blush never faded.

Tucking her D.D.D. away again, she rolled away from Beelzebub and onto her stomach to push herself up. “Good enough,” she said with a bright smile of acceptance. She’d won. “I’ll take that as a truce.” 

She looked back and forth between them. “Now, I’m going to go back to my room to finish getting ready.” A cursory dusting off of her clothes drew attention to the single stocking she was wearing. “Please try not to kill one another until I’m fully dressed at least?”

They were both so cute when they were red faced and staring. She made her way to the door and stepped over the trunk in her way. “If I have to come back here again for this, you two will be wearing the Get-Along Shirt,” she said.

She was gone before they could finish sharing perplexed expressions.


	2. After School Snack

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beelzebub and MC leave to try Hattusa for their afternoon snack.
> 
> Day 41, Friday, February 10th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for looking over the edits I made to these early chapters.

Fully dressed in something girly that Asmodeus had stashed in her closet, and now matching stockings, she made her way down to the main hall. The skirt was thinner than she’d anticipated despite the many layers of ruffles, but it did make a lovely swishing sound while she walked. 

She’d considered skinning Asmodeus alive when she’d seen how short all of the hemlines in her wardrobe had suddenly become, but these, thankfully, had built in shorts and she knew he’d eventually return her pants once she scolded him. It could wait one night. It wasn’t a good enough reason to keep Beelzebub waiting.

After reassuring an anxious Mammon that yes, she had her D.D.D. with her, right at her side in case Beelzebub forgot she wasn’t on the menu, and no he was not coming with them, she made her way to the front door. 

Borrowing Mammon’s jacket had been a consideration, but she’d thought better of it. His head might explode and it would take her at least fifteen minutes to get it from him anyway. It was easier just to put up with the touch of chill outside. The weather flux was bound to change soon; if she was lucky, it would be tonight and a jacket wouldn’t be needed.

Halfway down the stairs, she greeted Beelzebub with a smile that he didn’t return. It was quite jarring coming from him. Maybe he was just hungry? The frown he had was similar to how he looked when they’d initially met.

With a sudden clarity, she realized it was taking her much longer to get down the stairs than she was used to. She looked around in search of some new oddity to explain it; there was always a reason, even if she couldn’t find it right away. The stairs under her and before her were the same as always, but the door in the hall was just as far away as it had been a full minute ago. Finally, turning slowly to look behind her, she noticed the hand on her shoulder, its pressure mostly hidden by the strap of her satchel.

“Belphie, quit it,” she said, breaking her usual in-charge demeanor to pout. “Using your powers is cheating.” She felt slow and tired, drugged almost. How could she possibly walk all the way to Hattusa with Beelzebub if she could barely lift her legs?

One moment she was trying to put her foot on the next step and the next she was almost suffocating against Beelzebub’s firm chest. His arm had looped under one of hers, cradling her head and neck like she was a floppy newborn, while the other arm held her waist. He had collected her and zipped back down the stairs with her before she could fully draw a breath.

Pushing away for air and still a bit groggy, she turned in Beelzebub’s arms to try and figure out what was going on. Belphegor looked particularly displeased as his hands remained mid-air, where they had been when she’d been pulled away: one where her shoulder had been, and the other poised to sloth all the way over her like an Olympic swimmer’s front crawl. Was he stuck like that? The last of her grogginess dropped away when his arms fell to his sides. She’d only blinked once, and yet Belphegor was directly in front of them, his hand was reaching for her and her eyelids drooped again. She wanted to ask why he couldn’t slow the world while still moving at demonic speeds, but the world tilted sideways before she could speak.

“Beel!” she said, yelping at his abrupt movement of them both. The entry hall had disappeared and was replaced by the darkness outside. She scrunched her eyes shut against the wind as he jostled her, jogging with her under his arm the way he would when carrying Belphegor to classes. Despite having her eyes closed, she knew they had made it out of eyesight of the house based on how his speed had plastered her hair against her skull. “Beelzebub! This is not dignified!” she shouted loudly, suddenly very glad her outfit had built in shorts.

He looked surprised at her admonishment, as if he had never considered that humans should not be carried like a parcel. He set her down gingerly, trying his best to check her over for injuries without actually touching her again.

“I don’t know what is going on with you two, but I don’t particularly enjoy being a pawn in your current feud,” she said with a sour look and twist of her lips.

“Sorry,” he said, nodding his head, eyes downward cast. However, the corners of his mouth began to twitch upward before long.

She crossed her arms and tapped her finger on her elbow. “What’s so funny, Beel?” she asked.

“You look just like a miniature Satan when you’re angry,” he said trying not to laugh. “That’s probably the most dangerous I’ve heard a human sound in eons.” His attempts at hiding his smile were failing spectacularly. He was lucky his smile was so cute. 

The anger faded away with the remainder of her grogginess. She rolled her eyes and let her shoulders relax away from where they’d risen up to her ears. “Let’s just go, you bottomless pit,” she said with good humour and she started walking in the direction she thought they were headed.

"You know, compared to the others, Satan is a pretty decent guy...I think. Maybe," Beelzebub said, clearly trying to pad the landing of his previous observation.

After a short period of discussing the pros and cons of Satan’s fake smile, she was breathing a little harder than she’d expected, even for a brisk walk. “Beel, I know you’re hungry, but slow down, would you?”

He came to a full stop and looked at the distance he had managed to put between them in only a few steps. Three steps to every one of his, she’d been jogging to keep up with his long strides. 

His look of consternation made it obvious that he was antsy to leave. She waited to see if he would offer to walk more slowly before her mouth tightened into a lopsided grimace. “Just this once,” she said, “and you can’t tell your brothers or I’ll never get my feet under me again.”

He looked perplexed by her finger wag.

“Carry me there,” she said, her face blank of all but platonic expectation. It was a feat: being cuddled up to Beelzebub was always wonderful, movie nights were the coziest with him, but more often than not it made her feel as wanton as Asmodeus.

Awkwardly, Beelzebub moved to collect her, now trying to determine what was an acceptable way to carry a human after the previous admonishment. 

Rolling her eyes at him, she stepped into his space and put an arm around his neck before guiding one of his just above her hips. She tucked her satchel into the hollow of her waist, between them, and raised her other hand back up to its mate.

He hadn’t moved.

“Beel?” she asked.

No response.

She looked up at him. Was he dazed? No, that kind of thing only happened to Mammon and Leviathan. Based on his physique alone, she knew Beelzebub was no stranger to humanoids of the female persuasion attempting to touch him. She’d seen more than a few non-female demons hit on him too. This shouldn’t be out of the ordinary. He’d been as close as this to her during their workouts in order to correct her form and at least this close during a number or required dances in class. Maybe he was just afraid of injuring her? He _ had _ cradled her very carefully when he’d taken her from Belphegor.

“Beel,” she called his name again, this time more softly, watching him begin to focus as she shifted into bossy playfulness, “I’m going to jump, so you’d better catch me.” 

His eyes widened at that and she tried to smile at him. She jumped up without further explanation. “Catch!”

His free arm came up to scoop under her legs and he lifted her much higher than she had anticipated. Her arms were slack around him now. He’d lifted her until she was almost snuggled around his neck like a scarf, her satchel falling over his shoulder and down his back.

He looked down at her belly and nuzzled it with his nose before inhaling deeply. “So...hungry. You smell delicious,” he said.

“Gah! Beeeel! No eating the human!” she said, shrieking and giggling, fairly certain he wasn’t actually going to eat her. She had to admit, his sense of humour was definitely interesting, but she couldn’t complain about it today as it had broken the awkward and prickly tension that had stalked their departure.

Once more, he inhaled deeply. A soft rumbling from him tickled at her belly and for the hundredth time she wished she knew what he was saying. The frequency of his growl changed, and she contracted around his head like a cooked prawn, unable to stop laughing. When she was gasping for air, and Beelzebub was getting his own laughter under control, he lowered her to nestle her face against his chest, his arm coming back up again to hold her head in place.

She wondered at his gentleness for a moment, but her periphery quickly became a blur and stole her thoughts. Closing her eyes against the air, she tried not to tear up her makeup, and was grateful now that her head wasn’t bopping off of him with each of his bounding steps.


	3. Hattusa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life isn't easy as the human ambassador in Devildom but sometimes, being with Beelzebub makes it just a little bit easier.
> 
> Day 41, Friday, February 10th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Hattusa was lovely, much more relaxed than Ristorante Six.

They were shown to their seats without issue and Beelzebub motioned for her to sit across from him once the host had left, but she hesitated, rubbing her upper arm uncomfortably. Not the body language he had come to expect. What had happened to the fearless human from earlier?

“Would you mind if I took the inside seat next to you?” she asked. He could tell she was trying to feign indifference even with such a specific request.

He gestured for her to hop ahead of him and she slid into the small booth quickly. He was trying his best to keep his hanger to a minimum, but feeling Belphie’s displeasure, even from across town, was making his stomach churn.

Quickly, he ordered one of everything on the menu, with plans to order more once he decided what he liked best. Later, once the food arrived, he’d ask about her seating preference. He’d become used to sitting next to her at breakfast, so it wasn’t an issue for him now.

“Sorry about that,” she said after the server had left with their order. “Last time I went out, I was sitting on the outside and someone snatched me up.” She showed him the bruising and claw perforations on her tiny bicep. “It took Mammon two blocks to catch up.”

He didn’t know if the cringe she expressed with her whole frame was from the rough handling, or if it was from what Mammon likely did to the demon after he caught up. Hopefully, he did it out of her sight. It was unlikely she’d enjoy seeing that. Beelzebub slid her water closer to her. “You’re safe here,” he said.

She nodded and smiled. “Thanks for the reminder,” she said, before looking up. “It’s nice that we’re covered too.”

Did she mean something about the weather or did Mammon lose her briefly to something hungry with wings? There would definitely need to be a discussion about this when he got home.

As the food began to arrive, the smile returned to her eyes. “Thanks for inviting me,” she said. “It’s really nice to have someone to go out with who also enjoys food.” She looked away from him but her smile grew wider. “And who won’t judge me if I order a second dessert.” 

He suspected her favourite reason for joining him actually had something to do with watching  _ him _ eat. The more excited he was for a meal, the happier she seemed to be. It had gotten to the point where his tunnel vision took longer to take hold; he was too busy watching her watch him. His mouth watered; he wasn't sure if it was solely for the expected meal ahead or for her attention as well. As long as he managed not to destroy any more walls in front of her again, he could keep her smiling at him.

The way he pushed the most human-food-like substances towards her was anything but discreet. It was practically tradition now and he no longer felt embarrassed about curating for her. Meals at home were no different. Sharing plates was normal. Very normal. Right?

At least, she’d never complained about it before. Then again, she never said anything when her food tried to escape off her plate either, rather she’d lean away and let it flee. Was he being too forward with his affections?

“Not a fan of leafy things, I see,” she said, as he loaded a fourth helping of something green onto her growing collection of plates.

“Vegetables will keep you healthy,” he said, gesturing with his fork at the nearest allium tart. His hand rose to cover his mouth belatedly. He hadn’t spit any food as he spoke. but it had been a close thing. Smooth.

She laughed at him and passed him a napkin. Thankfully, she didn’t mention his growing blush.

Slowing his chewing, he tried to rein in his appetite. He’d come here to enjoy her company, not just stuff his face, and with the restaurant’s appetizers already under his belt, he finally felt in control enough to take his time and think beyond the next plate. Was it possible she actually  _ was  _ the kind of person to starve herself because he and Belphegor were arguing? The concept alone made his stomach cramp with empathy and need.

After a few morsels and making note of different things that she liked, Beelzebub felt he had a better idea of what she preferred, but he was learning to ask more often to be sure. “You don’t like the pickled loach intestines because of the sour aroma?”

“Hmm?” she asked, looking up from tightly wrapping the innards in lamb’s lettuce. “No, actually it’s the slimy mouth feel.” She continued rolling up the bits of loach inside the leaf. “But if I use this green with the waxy top and spread the meats over the velvety underside before rolling it up, then it’s not half bad.” 

“I want in on that too,” he said, reaching toward the most central platter to add the appropriate fixings to his own plate. How had he never thought of that combination before? “This is great!” he said, this time remembering to cover his full mouth as he used up all of the fixings. “This works really well. Good discovery.”

From most of the remaining menu, he continued to slide a portion of each order toward her, but it was becoming clear she was having trouble keeping up with the constant conveyor belt of dishes, and he became more discerning in what he nudged towards her. 

With his mouth full, he gave a pronounced nod to one of her bite sized morsels, to encourage her on. He would’ve dropped his face into his hands if they weren’t already full with shadow goose burger. She’d tried to offer it to him instead, and he’d had to lean away from her tilted plate to make sure she kept it, using his fork to wave her away. He realized too late that he’d speared a charred poison belly newt and was inadvertently making it dance in front of her face. 

“You’re ridiculous,” she said, laughing into her own napkin, and the newt quickly disappeared into his mouth.

“You’re not eating,” he said, pointing his now empty fork to one of the plates that had grown tall with his choices for her.

“That’s not true,” she said, “It’s just…” She paused, clearly trying to think of a polite word. He knew well the struggle of hunger against ugly looking food.

“Unappetizing to a human?” he asked.

She tilted her head to the side, then looked down and away. 

Maybe humans thought it was rude if they said it out loud? “You are what you eat. You know what that means, right?" he asked, gently poking her with his fork.

“If I eat you, I’ll be completely empty?” she asked, her tone rising with uncertainty. 

Curling in over his plate, he started laughing. He was dying. He hadn’t expected her to think it was a riddle.

“Well, now I’ve done it,” she said, dropping her napkin over her nearest plate. “That’s it. They’ll execute me for sure. I’ve just killed the Avatar of Gluttony.” She leaned closer to him and giggled when he laughed harder at her proclamation.

A spider-leg noodle shot out his nose; he was no longer certain if he was still laughing or choking, either way he wasn’t sure he could stop.

Her hand was at his back, somewhere between a comforting pat and a knocking thump to bring him back to himself. His body remained crumpled over his arms, protecting his meal, until he stretched out one hand to grab at a small mountain of napkins, still wheezing.

“You okay?” she asked, concerned, though her amusement still stole into her tone.

He sat up and dabbed at his eyes, squeaking out a strained “yes” at a much higher pitch than he’d meant to use. “You might become a bit hardier and less prone to dying was my general idea,” he said, continuing to cough.

Her eyes said the “ooooh” for her. “Well, I’m glad you got to have part of your meal twice, there,” she said and watched his cheeks burn red in response.

“Not my intention, but I definitely didn’t expect your answer,” he said, his voice slowly returning to its usual baritone. He drank deeply from the pitcher of fresh, sparkling, bloody soda in front of him.

“Tell you what, I will pick out some different, non-dangerous things,” he said as he slid away her original plate, “and you will try them without looking.” He knew a thing or two about picky eaters; Belphegor was notorious for falling asleep rather than eating something outside his usual palate.

Her skeptical look didn’t deter him; instead, he looked through his pockets, and coming up empty handed, unclipped one of the decorative purple linings from his outfit.

When he raised the fabric near her eye level and attempted to pass the makeshift blindfold to her, she leaned away and into the booth wall. Her body language practically shouted:  _ You want me blind? My neighbours regularly try to eat me!  _

Did she think he couldn’t keep her safe? He dropped his outstretched hands and put an elbow on the table, squaring his shoulders to her. “I may be the sixth most powerful to Mammon’s second, but I am much more capable when it comes to looking after wee things.”

A mirage of emotions flickered across her face.They shifted so quickly between one another that he was hard pressed to name them. He was sure a muttered “I’m not a wee thing” accompanied it, but he was already glancing back at the table and carts and couldn’t be sure whether he’d imagined it. They’d already made it at least a quarter of the way through their meal; his hunger could wait a while if she would put her trust in him.

“I will not eat until you are un-blindfolded again,” he said with as much seriousness as he could muster. He turned back to meet her eyes. She needed to know she was always safe with him.

It was so interesting watching her unfamiliar tells. The way her body didn’t quite rock from side to side, but rotated very slightly as she considered his words. It reminded him of the fluffy cockatrice chick he had briefly adopted. It would hop from foot to foot before deciding to venture forth and explore something new too. 

Eventually, she took the purple strip of fabric from him and tied it over her eyes herself. She didn’t know how it swelled his chest with pride as she did so. 

He pushed her original plate back in front of her. ‘What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her,’ he thought, then paused. ‘That felt far too much like something Belphie would think.’

“Beel?” she asked quietly.

“Just picking something,” he said, trying to keep any gruffness from his voice. Their meals at home had helped inform him of her general preferences and dislikes, but he found she was more forthcoming with specifics when they were out. He’d been quickly learning her actual palate and putting it to the test, usually in the company of at least one of his brothers. But today was special. Everyone else, everyone but Belphegor, had been busy, and now he had their mistress all to himself. 

He liked the way her fingertips traced along the edge of the table while she waited. He wanted her to trace them over his hands like that when they watched movies together, the same way they skirted over the tops of his knuckles when she reached for popcorn, but more. 

They would have to do this again. Maybe every time from now on, if the way her lips wrapped around his spoon was anything to go by. Remembering food was never a problem for him, but he might not be able to ever forget _ this _ .

His free hand strummed on the table while his other fed her from his own cutlery. They should have just taken all of this to go. She’d feel safer, and he’d have a pillow to hide this growing erection.

Motioning to the server from across the room, he indicated that he’d take the rest to go before quickly turning back to watch her evaluate the newest morsel with her tongue. It was obvious that she swallowed the ones she liked the least promptly and slowly savoured every bite of the ones she enjoyed most. From the way her shoulders moved to the way she licked her lips, he was entranced. If they hadn’t been in public, he’d have already asked to feed her while she sat in his lap. 

A flood of anger surged through him and caught him off guard. He could feel it pulsing in his veins and steadied himself. At least it had come at an opportune time. He tried to cool the foreign but familiar emotions. Clearly, Belphie was bitter about him indulging his lust and enjoyment momentarily. Well, momentarily with  _ her _ .

A squeaking “mmmph” made itself known, and Beelzebub looked back only to realize he had both hands in use, squishing her mouth a bit too roughly with his spare hand when feeding her that last bite.

He withdrew his hand and she managed to swallow before asking, “Everything okay?”

“Sorry. I…uh, Simeon is hiding candy from the Celestial Realm. I thought about how much I want it," he said, the lie rolling off of his tongue haltingly. He could see she was trying her best not to laugh at him, and he tried his best not to lick the sauce from the corner of her mouth.

Carefully, he cupped her face in his hand again and dabbed the sauce away gently with a napkin.

“All clean?” she asked, keeping her hands relaxed in her lap.

He loved that despite being sightless and surrounded by demons who likely wouldn’t think twice about eating her, she remained unconcerned in his company. Even when he grabbed her roughly, she hadn’t pulled away. He licked his thumb and tenderly brushed it across her lower lip, removing a non-existent smudge. “All clean,” he said, keeping his voice even.

She took off the make-shift blindfold and handed it back to him, eyeing her previous plate suspiciously. “Beel…”

“Ah,” he said, not looking up as he clipped the strap back on to his outfit.

“Don’t you ‘ah’, me. Did you feed me the things I purposefully pushed away?”

She was playing with him. He poked her forehead. “I fed you the things that would make you strong.” This side of her, the playful anger, the way she looked when she was like this, was what he enjoyed most. It was nothing like Satan’s seriousness. But it was cut short when she drew it back into herself as a new server approached.

It wasn’t the first time he’d seen her pull back to reassess her surroundings or those coming into them, but it was the first time without anyone else around to distract him from committing it to memory. The slow perusal of her gaze over the possible threat reminded him of a honeybee at the beginning of its foraging career: flower-naive and sizing up a sealed bloom before biting a hole in the hollow spur to rob it of its nectar, clever and resourceful. 

“I hope you’ve had a lovely time this evening,” the demoness said to Beelzebub. “It really is kind of your to bring your human with you to such a nice place.”

Beelzebub debated whether to correct her, but settled on ignoring the comment.

“Is there anything else I can get you and your sweet human?”

“If you want to hit on him, please just do it. I don’t belong to anyone and I don’t enjoy being used as a prop in your pursuit,” his mistress drawled, letting the unamused words out slowly to be sure she had the demoness’ full attention. 

This was hardly the first time something like this had happened when one of the brothers accompanied her, but usually Asmodeus or Mammon had been present and would take the opportunity to whisk her away while Beelzebub was left to disentangle himself. That, or he'd pick up Asmodeus and put him between the admirers and himself. Usually worked like a charm.

“Oooh, aren’t you just the cutest little thing. Does she do any tricks?” the demoness asked Beelzebub.

He watched his human’s eyebrows nearly rise into her hairline. This would solve itself, he was sure. She’d always managed these interactions fine while with his brothers, hadn’t she? He’d never heard of any incidents before. Then again, none of them would be willing to admit to allowing anything to happen either, not unless it was serious enough to have repercussions.

“I could just eat you up!” the demoness continued as she reached across the table to pinch a rosy human cheek.

The clawed hand retreated from his mistress’ personal space faster than she could have possibly seen, but her fork still came down and stuck in the new table surface, without the demonic hand under it.

Eyes widening in surprise, he looked between the two women. His mistress was not hiding her irritation and the server was holding her smile too stationary. There didn’t seem to be any true ill intent, and they were already leaving; it would only slow their departure if he said something now.

“So feisty!”

“I didn’t realize demons considered bodily autonomy feisty.”

“Just the bill please,” Beelzebub said, attempting to sway their attention from one another.

“You know, you’re giving humans a bad reputation with that attitude of yours.” The server propped her fist upon her hip and narrowed her eyes. Her smile had fallen into something pinched and disapproving.

“Given the reputation of demons in Terra Firma, I’d expect you to be going much further out of your way to repair  _ that _ misconception, rather than pawing at me.”

The demoness tensed as though she’d been doused in cold water and Beelzebub glanced at the trolley of cooling food just as she looked over to him for support. Couldn’t she tell that she was doing more to annoy him than anything else? He tapped his fingers on the table impatiently.

“And perhaps fragile humans shouldn’t be so outspoken,” she said, turning back to his guest. “I’m sure you wouldn’t be so high and mighty without your escort to keep you in line. We wouldn’t want that cute little mouth of yours to get you in trouble, now would we?” The words were all false sugar.

“Oh, this she-devil is going to eat fork,” his mistress grit out.

Beelzebub grabbed her arm as she rose to give the demoness a piece of her mind and utensils. Aiming not to hurt her, he tried to keep her in place. He wanted to kick himself for letting it get to this point. His stomach dropped, all thoughts of eating gone. If she hadn’t been furious before, his hand holding her back and proving the demoness right was likely bringing her very, very close to it. 

With his eyes, he tried to convey that he would deal with the problem now, if she would let him, and when she seemed willing to stay in her seat, he released her wrist. “Please don’t bother my guest. You’re doing your establishment a disservice,” he said, his words placid, seemingly unruffled by the exchange occurring across him.

“I didn’t do anything wrong,” their server said matter-of-factly, both hands now on her hips. “Humans should know their place. Prince Diavolo or not, they’re lucky to be allowed in an establishment like this.”

Clearly, his words weren’t enough after he’d been a quiet bystander for so long. He could feel the air around him flicker with his frustration, and his horns wavered in and out of existence. Taking in a calming breath, he tried to rein in his temper. He tried to think of the food around them to distract himself. 

The sensation of a small, gentle hand settling into the crook of his elbow helped him concentrate. He looked at her blunt nails and the flickering stopped so that he could watch as his casual parka solidified once more under her palm. She left her hand where it was and part of him wanted to move closer to her so that he could have her other hand too.

With her opposite elbow propped up on the table, she held her chin in her hand, canting her head to the side with intense interest aimed at their server. The fork never left its place, still balanced between her chin and palm, at the ready. 

He swallowed as he watched her eyes scan the room once more before mischief filled them. It was no wonder she got on so well with Satan and Belphie. Fluttering her lashes, she matched their server smile for smile.

“How long does it take you to clean your wings? Do you have to do that every day? Or just once a week? Maybe that depends on the demon. Do some demons get wing build-up faster than others? Do you have to sharpen your nails or do they just grow like that? Would you mind trying to put your claws through this table? Why not?” She exaggerated her expressions while she asked, quickly amping up the pace of her inane questions and not bothering to wait for replies. “Ooooh, they’re not as sharp as they look? Pity.”

She sucked at her teeth in a disdainful manner. “Do they at least have venom in them? No? Oh well. Oh, maybe you know Azazel? Or was it Az-az-el?” Her own human customer-service laugh rang out. “Your names are so weird and hard to pronounce, I’ll just call him Azzy.”

The demoness was looking more uncomfortable and defensive as the one-sided conversation went on. Her wings twitched in agitation.

Beelzebub had seen the expression on his mistress’ face before, usually on Belphie when he wasn’t ready to let prey escape.

Her hand slid off of his arm. “Please go put your hands on that demon right there. Mhmm, that one, the one with three arms, what looks like about sixteen eyes, and the yellow, dripping goo,” she said, pointing. “Yeah, go grab one of their hands and tell them they look tasty. Then try to pet them. I’m interested to see their reaction. Pinch his cheek if you have time?”

The server’s eyes were hard as flint and her anger was evident from the red tips of her ears and the subtle spread of her wings. It was true, if Beelzebub weren’t there, she would already be a puny human corpse. 

A sigh, more irritated than triumphant, left his mistress when the demoness stormed off. Only a few ears had swivelled in the direction of the hushed but cutting voices, but one attuned ear was all it took to make it a scene that would get back to Lucifer and possibly embarrass Diavolo.

The demoness returned with the bill, not attempting to hide her scorn when she dropped it on the table.

“Have the remainder delivered,” Beelzebub said, motioning to the carts. His words were always blunt and to the point, but this time the soft timber of his voice did little to diminish the directive. As much as he tried to keep his terseness to a minimum when he kept company with his mistress, he was getting annoyed.

“We don’t do delivery,” the demoness said, failing to keep her smirk tucked away.

Beelzebub sighed, picked up his D.D.D., and selected a favourite from his contacts. “Hey,” he said when the polite and cultured voice answered. “No, it’s not an emergency. I need a favour.” He appreciated that he never had to say much, that his conversation must’ve been seen a hundred times before he even picked up the phone. “Mhmm…ah…anyone with spatial spell abilities will do.”

He laughed at the warning that he’d best not eat the servant being sent, and the server looked peeved at being ignored. She was only distracted from her departure by the human suddenly perking up and waving madly at someone across the establishment.

“Thanks, Barbatos. I owe you one. Ah…if you ever clone yourself, let me know. We could keep him at home very comfortably…well, yes, maybe, his arms might fall off…I appreciate it.”

When he set down the D.D.D., his mistress waved happily from her seat at the figure that approached. “Inara!” she said, greeting the newcomer when they drew close enough.

The server began to shrink away.

“There you two are. I had heard you and Lord Beelzebub had skipped out on my restaurant this week, but I should have known to expect you at the opening of my newest one,” Inara said, her words teasing and good-natured as always.

Still seated in the booth, Beelzebub could easily see the cogs continuing to turn in the server’s mind. She beat a hasty retreat with one of the heavily laden trolleys.

“Leaving already?” Inara asked them, concerned as she watched the cart make a quick exit into the kitchen.

“Ah. We should talk later.” Beelzebub said, “Barbatos will be sending someone to transport the remainder of our order.” He watched his mistress out of the corner of his eye. Had she smiled because he’d said  _ our _ order or was it just because of Inara’s presence? She didn’t seem fully placated from the previous encounter.

“Transport?” Inara asked with confusion, looking between the two of them. “Why not use our delivery service as you usually do? Are all of the shadow hogs already out?”

The human pressed her lips tightly together and looked away awkwardly, anywhere but at the two demons in front of her.

“Mmm. We should definitely talk soon,” Beelzebub said as he eyed the kitchen doors.

Inara seemed to take the hint and let it slide. “Well, I’m very sorry to have missed you. We’ll have to have a make up lunch some time soon.”

The mood was ruined, and there was no point in staying. He stood with an amicable nod to Inara and offered his hand to his mistress as she wiggled out of her place at the back of the booth. She seemed surprised, when Inara also reached out to help her up.

He wished it had been him who had brought her smile back, but he was grateful for Inara’s help. They lifted her a foot off the floor before setting her down; her blush at being hoisted up like a child was cute. If he looked at it from her point of view, it was probably nice to be reminded that, outside of his brothers, not every demon thought of her as a walking meal. 

Later, he’d find a way to reward the genuine smile the proprietress always had ready for his mistress.

“Until next time,” they heard as she finished walking them out past the line of new customers.


	4. The Cold Walk Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC and Beelzebub walk home after their uncomfortable encounter.
> 
> Day 41, Friday, February 10th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

As the darkness around them sunk from a far away grey into an opaque pitch black, more lights bloomed overhead to illuminate their path. The walk home was much slower than their departure, but the lighting on the streets was beautiful and worth the leisurely pace. He liked the way that the cobblestones glowed ahead of them when Devildom’s twilight hit. Belphie never minded when he noted things he liked. Would his mistress want to know that he liked such things or was that something he should keep to himself? 

“I’m sorry I lost my temper,” she said after several minutes of silence. “I didn’t mean to cut your meal short.”

He nodded. “Don’t worry. Inara will instruct her.”

By the introspective frown that creased her forehead, she either wasn’t sure what he'd meant or she disagreed. The awkwardness was palpable between them now and he tried to keep from wringing his hands. How had he let that situation get out of control so quickly? Everything was so much easier when he could follow orders or eat: nothing to think about, just something to complete. 

He should have intervened when things were still in that fuzzy grey area. It’d been so long since they’d consolidated power down here that now he had nothing but time to think—think and eat—and right now, rather than distract his hunger, his worry over her opinion was making it worse.

A giddy feeling began to swell in him, as if he were only breathing with the tops of his lungs. Belphegor was clearly amused at his frustration and regret.

Jarring him out of his thoughts, an icy grasp encased his pinky and ring finger. He looked over his shoulder to realize he had been walking too fast again.

“Beel, is everything okay?”

‘Ugh!’ he thought, feeling his frustration ripple back at him as Belphegor’s glee. He’d clearly been too preoccupied and missed a bid for his attention. “Sorry. Just distracted,” he said, stopping and placing his other hand over hers, “but you are freezing!”

She released his fingers as he pulled his hand back into his parka sleeve. Her surprise, as she watched him shrug out of the warm outer layer, embarrassed him. Did she think he'd let her get cold on his watch? Maybe he should wrap her up in his arms and warm her that way instead, at least then her surprise, and his reddening cheeks, would be warranted.

“Why did Asmo put this in your closet?” he asked, a small rumbly growl accompanying his words as he bundled her in his parka. “Usually he prefers furs at this low level of the flux.” 

She scrunched up her nose at the mention of Asmodeus and shrugged herself into the arm holes presented to her. “I told Asmo that I didn’t want Cerberus to have more of a reason to think of me as a chew toy,” she said, while attempting to push the sleeves up her arms. “That and cactus-cat fur isn’t exactly harmless to human touch.”

Taking a knee, Beelzebub moved her cold, fumbling hands out of the way to zip the parka up for her. Should he tell her she looked good covered in his clothing? Flirting wasn’t his strong suit. But he wanted her to wear it all the time. Hopefully, his future actions would be enough to make up for his inaction earlier, and then some. He just had to get her home first. Then their tastings could re-commence.

“Were you distracted thinking about your argument with Belphie?” she asked. She looked uncertain, but adorable, letting him zip her up and wearing what amounted to an igloo with blue and orange decorations on it. 

“Ah,” he said, knowing to take her seriously when she seemed hesitant. She tilted her head in confusion, and he realized he must’ve appeared discouraged from her perspective. It made him feel warm inside, having her fret over him. The memory of her almost stabbing their server suddenly came to mind, the polar opposite to her gentle worry now. Maybe she had two sides as much as he did.

“What?” she asked, venturing after the fleeting smile he’d let escape.

He shook his head and stood up. It wasn’t something to discuss right now.

“Wait!”

This time it was his turn to look confused as she partially unzipped the parka to rummage at her side for something.

Putting his hand completely over his face, he tried not to laugh aloud. Of course she did.

Insistently, she pushed the napkin wrapped food toward him. “You seemed to like them,” she said while trying not to let her own thoughts on the food in question be known.

Taking the stick from her tiny fingers and unwrapping it, he beamed down at her, watching how she tried not to do the almost undetectable happy-wiggle she usually reserved for desserts.

“Bufo eye kabob,” he said, tucking the napkin away before retrieving her cold hand with his empty one. “You have a keen sense for delicacies.”

She didn’t comment on whether it was a delicacy. “One for the road seemed like a good idea,” she said instead. “After all, you almost devoured me getting to the restaurant. I’ve got to guard myself for the return trip!”

About to protest, he caught her wink and her following laughter. Not for the first time, he found himself wondering how such a tiny human could hold so much fortitude and mirth. Her bravery and wit were sharp and pointy just like her bony elbows. They really did need to feed her up, she was much too small, and always catching cold; the only thing big and warm about her seemed to be her heart.

Ignoring the echoing sting of resentment in the back of his mind, Beelzebub ate as slowly as he could while they began to walk again. A few crows hopped along the path, stalking them in case they left behind anything worth scavenging.

“Beel, I’m not a child, you’re not going to lose me on a brightly lit path,” she said, half-heartedly trying to tug her hand out of his.

“Safety first,” he said around an eyeball and readjusted her hand to fit more completely in his.

She grimaced at the sound of popping and squelching, but kept her hand where it was. 


	5. Drained

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beelzebub is thwarted by MC's sleepiness but plenty of hijinx still abounds for her.
> 
> Day 41, Friday, February 10th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing of my update to these early chapters <3

It was clear she was growing tired near the end of their walk. Beelzebub had enough experience with Belphie to know when someone was nodding off on their feet. While it was hardly late enough for even a human to sleep, everything had an equal and opposite reaction in the end. He’d watched her nearly spit fire and take up makeshift claws; it only made sense that she would begin to dip into sluggishness now.

‘Well, that cancels further sampling plans,’ he thought, trying not to let his disappointment show. He’d just have to go work off his frustration in the gym later. If he was lucky maybe he could coax her into a midnight snack. She was only a wall away from the kitchen. It wouldn’t be far to venture.

“I'll go to your room later. I want to eat some food with you,” he said at the base of the stairs, and shoo-ed her to her room for sleep when she paused to unzip his parka.

She yawned and gave him a watery smile, and he watched as a Little Demon traipsed next to her, hopping up and down on each stair she stepped upon, cheering her on in silent exuberance.

It was ridiculous how easily she polarized demons. They either loved her or hated her, usually only to love her later. Not even angels could manage that much. The Little Demons had been no different. He knew Mammon had introduced her to a tiny Greed demon, and later she had given it a Grimm she’d found on her way home from R.A.D. It had loyally followed her ever since.

He’d seen it smooth out rugs when it looked like she was about to obliviously trip over them. Simply because she was asleep in the same room, another Little Demon had put a log on the dying fire, like a large ant pressing a huge weight. He laughed to himself, imagining Lucifer’s reaction when he realized she had collected a cult following of Little Demons by now.

With a bit of time, she likely would have converted the server at Hattusa. It was like watching dye slowly wick up through fabric. Her affection couldn't be avoided and it soaked into them all, climbing higher until they finally realized too late that she was there to stay.

‘Later,’ he thought. When he’d selected a dessert for them to share, that’s when he’d collect his parka, for now, the house was still cold. Demons certainly didn’t need fires and humans got sick too easily; she would get more use out of it tonight than he would in a lifetime. 

Knowing Barbatos wouldn’t have let him down, he made his way to the kitchen instead.

* * *

She looked at the clock at the top of the staircase through bleary eyes. It was only slightly after supper, and she had promised Leviathan that she would stop by to collect a new set of manga.

When she turned left instead of right, the Little Demon at her side gave out a high pitched babble. She was certain it was some sort of Infernal dialect, but spoken in too high a register for her to understand, not that she could pick out more than a handful of words as it was. ‘These demons and their extremes,’ she thought tiredly.

“I have to stop and see Leviathan first,” she said to it. Thankfully, it always seemed to get the jist of what _ she _ was saying.

It gave a knowing squeak, and ran off ahead of her, its feet slapping away as hundreds of tiny pitter-patters.

Halfway to the soothing aquarium filled room, a soft, floral smell permeated her dull senses. It was warm and inviting. She paused to enjoy it and recover her energy for the visit with the difficult otaku.

She felt the hug envelop her from behind, soft hair tickling her face. “Evening, Asmo,” she said, stifling another yawn and bringing her hands up to settle on his arms and keep them from wandering. 

“My, my, so worn out and covered from knee to neck in Beel’s clothing,” he said playfully. “Just what kind of after school snack did you two get up to?”

She snuggled backwards into him. As long as she stayed complementary and neutral he wasn’t much danger to her. Oh, he’d try to rile her up with the drag of a nail here, or a smooch just a little too friendly on her neck there, but when she showed discomfort he would retreat. Apparently, the best way to ward off lust was disquiet. The mortal enemy of lust was  _ eeew. _

“If you don't get your beauty sleep, your skin's going to pay for it later,” he said, chiding her when she didn’t rise to his bait.

“I’ve got to see Levi before sleep, but you’re welcome to be my cuddle buddy tonight,” she said to appease him. She could feel his shoulders slump around her in defeat.

“Well, I really am most radiant at night, of course you would want me,” he said, lauding himself, “but you’re not wearing _ this  _ if you’re in my bed.” He pulled at the parka, giving a little sniff of disdain.

“Too bad, we’re in mine then,” she said, turning her head to stick her tongue out at him. Oh, the many ideas she watched tumble in his head from that single, impulsive response.

She walked to Leviathan’s door, wearing Asmodeus as her cape, but when she knocked there was no response. ‘I’m not going to sway here in sleepiness forever just because he has his headphones cranked up,’ she thought, uninterested in waiting to play the password game today.

Pushing the door open, she found the room empty, and she was sure Asmodeus could feel her consternation throughout her tensing frame.

“Oooh, you’re SO cute!” Asmodeus said, taking in her pouty face. “Now, let's go spend some quality time together, shall we?” He patted her hand and promenaded her back to her room, never letting her completely escape his arms.

He was always such a flirt. His actual personality, when he turned off the persona, was still mostly a mystery to her. Mammon was squishy and sweet when he dialed back his greed, but Asmodeus rarely let her peek behind  _ his _ wall of sin. The way he mother-henned her, walking her back to her room, was a nice change from the seductive amour he usually kept between them. Even if it was a small moment, it was the kind she treasured with him.

She felt his huff coming before the breath struck her neck, like a cat bristling before spitting.

With her Little Demon guide right behind him, Leviathan had just stepped out of her bedroom.

“There you are!” Leviathan said, marching towards them. “Wait! Was this just one of your  _ normie _ tactics to get me out of my room?”

“But…” she started in confusion, “I just came from your room. You weren’t there?”

“You didn’t say she was this tired,” Leviathan said to the Little Demon before speaking to her. “Well,” he motioned with comically large arm gestures, “you’d better get in here then. We’re just about to start the fourth episode of TSL.”

An ugly, little noise percolated in the back of Asmodeus’ throat and she actually had to turn around fully in his arms to look at him.

He didn’t acknowledge that any such sound had come from him. Instead, he leaned down to whisper seductively in her ear, practically arching all of her into his body as he did so. “I’ll have to take a raincheck, love. I don’t want to get otaku all over me.”

Breathing normally, she resisted the urge to sigh and lean into him, and his hold loosened when he didn’t get the response he wanted.

Raising her hand, she cupped his cheek.  _ There _ was the sparkle in his eye. She could see the lascivious and victorious thoughts beginning to crest, and she smooched him chastely on the cheek. “Good night, Asmodeus,” she said, leaving his arms to walk sleepily past Leviathan and into her bedroom, to all onlookers, completely unaffected.

Asmodeus tossed his hair and sauntered away with the excuse of a party to attend. Leviathan trailed after her, and only the Little Demon was there to see the Avatar of Lust tenderly raise his hand to his cheek before he was out of sight.


	6. ASMODEUS!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC really just wants to sleep and everything seems to be conspiring to keep her from it.
> 
> Day 41, Friday, February 10th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

The light of the projector flashed brightly overhead, illuminating her ceiling. She was happy they would no longer all have to use her floor and cushions for viewing, but she was not happy to find Mammon and Belphegor already taking up the majority of her bed.

Putting her satchel on the floor, she motioned her hands feebly at them to move. Nothing from Belphegor. It was hard to tell if he was feigning sleep or not.

“What in the ten Bolgias are you wearing?” Mammon asked, his question an affronted squawk.

Glancing down at the loose sleeves pooled at her wrists she shrugged. “Doesn't matter. Move over. ‘Mm sleepy.”

“Whaddya mean it doesn’t matter?” he asked, much louder than she wanted right now.

“Mammon,” she said when he paused to inhale, “I almost stabbed a waitress today and I’m sleepy. Mooooove.”

“No way you can boss THE Mammon around,” he said, and she watched him dig his heels into her soft mattress.

Stepping up onto the bed, the projector shining in her face was blinding, but she managed to step over Belphegor without tripping on him. She put her stockinged foot on Mammon’s belly and wiggled it none too gently. “Stop being a brat and let me into my own bed,” she said. The absurdity of her kicking a bajillion year old demon was taking the edge off of her peevishness and she couldn’t help the smile that cracked her grumpy façade. 

“Take off that ugly ass jacket and I’ll consider it!”

She looked up to the ceiling in supplication, her palms turning up as well. “What have I done to deserve such contrary demons?” she asked.

“Listen here, Human,” Mammon said, clearly revving up for a proper rant.

A faint breeze moved the tips of her hair, and she tossed her head to shoo the sensation away. She dropped into a crouch, immediately bringing herself closer to Mammon, shocking him into momentary silence as he reached for her, thinking she was falling. Settling her weight, she pressed her knees into his side, just enough to wedge herself in place.

If she wasn’t careful, and couldn’t get Mammon to move, she’d end up ass over teakettle, flipped over the fulcrum of Belphegor’s hip and face first onto the floor. “Mammon,” she said, sandwiching his face between her hands, “I love you, but so help me, if you don’t make room for me, I will banish you to the floor for the rest of the night.”

The projector only gave enough light for her to see the hint of a blush on the tips of his ears, but she knew it for the full body blush it was: she’d said the L-word _ and _ was touching him. Behind her she could hear Leviathan snorting to himself and was sure she heard a “SENT!” in there as well.

“Levi,” she called in warning, “be nice or I won’t sign you up for that next programming course after all.”

“Whaddya think you're doin'?! Ya can't go around feelin' me up like that!” Mammon said, completely ignoring her demand, and Leviathan, prodding her knees instead.

She stared at him and held up three fingers. “Three.”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

“Two.”

“I am THE Mammon, you can’t order me around like this!”

“One.”

“Fine, fine, fine!” he said holding up his hands, “Just take off the stupid jacket before ya lay down. I don’t wanna to be smelling cheeseburger grease all night.”

She unzipped it with a bit more force than she’d meant to and the tab stuck at the bottom. Shrugging, she let it pool around her hips, ready to shuck it off completely despite her unsteady position.

With obvious confusion, Mammon took in her sudden panicked expression. He tensed, concerned as she quickly pulled the parka back on and tightly around herself. What was she going to do?

When Mammon shifted his weight on the mattress to inspec his faulty human, her hands were still stuck inside the jacket, holding it to her shoulders. Eyes wide, but tight-lipped she tipped backward, unable to keep her balance with Mammon moving about.

She squeezed her eyes shut and waited for the anger to erupt around her when she landed in the crook of Belphegor’s belly and thighs. It never lasted long with it was she who woke him, but still his retribution could be indiscriminate. ‘One,’ she thought. ‘Two. Three. Four seconds.’ Even Mammon had frozen in silence. ‘Six. Seven.’ Nothing. Belphegor was still sound asleep. Her shoulders relaxed as she breathed a sigh of relief, but her grip on the parka didn’t budge an inch.

“What in Diavalo’s name are ya doin’?” Mammon asked.

“Asmodeus” was the only word that growled out of her. Her head hanging off the side of the bed, she saw a Little Demon scurry underneath, right through the broken side board, for safety. The mattress shifted again when Mammon leaned away. Even Belphegor tried to bring his knees closer to his stomach, squeezing her in response to her simmering anger.

“What are you going on about?” Mammon asked in confusion.

“That sneaky bastard stole my bra!”

She was sure Leviathan’s eyes were anime-wide right now, if Mammon’s saucers were anything to go by. “Oooh. He just worked his way out of cuddles tomorrow! No, you know what…I don’t know if it’ll work but if it does he deserves  _ this _ .”

A faint purple glow outlined Leviathan now, and she could see the looks being passed between him and Mammon; they were trying to decide whether to panic or hunt Asmodeus down.

It wasn’t late, she wasn’t worried about waking anyone except Belphegor, and if this worked then he’d find Asmodeus’ punishment worth waking up to. “ASMODEUS!” she yelled as loudly as she could. She could feel a weak hold on the pact, just the faintest brush of magic against her consciousness. It was easier than usual. His cologne still lingered around her. “You are forbidden from touching yourself for the next five hours!” she shouted in the direction of his room. 

Something inside her shifted in a place that she couldn’t pinpoint. It felt like the twang of a string being plucked. She’d never actually commanded her pacts to do anything before, was that what it was supposed to feel like when it worked?

Mammon fell off the bed, wedged between it and the wall, clutching his stomach. Leviathan who had managed to sneak his way over to the projector had joined him on the floor in laughter.

Huffing at the bundle of craziness her life had become, she struggled out of the parka and hung it on the nearest hook on her winding headboard. She peeled off her stockings and threw them at the boys writhing on the floor before she tucked herself under the covers.

The laughter became choking sputters when she tossed the frilly skirt out from under the sheets.

Let them be idiots. It’s not like they’re millennia old soldiers and lords of the Devildom or anything. Why their brains nearly melted over such little things, she didn’t think she’d ever comprehend. “If you’re going to stay, pick an episode and put it on autoplay, or go to sleep,” she said, her yawn garbling most of her words.

At least the Little Demon understood her. It hopped on the play button and she let the background noise of squeaky anime characters lull her to sleep.


	7. I've Got Sunshine on a Cloudy Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

The room had long since grown quiet by the time Belphegor opened his eyes. Leviathan had lifted Mammon, and dragged him out of the room with his tail, presumably to put Mammon to bed before retreating to his own lair.

They assumed he’d leave for the planetarium, unable to stay asleep the whole night through. They should have known better.

Belphegor wrapped his arm around the human and pulled her snug against him, nuzzling into the back of her neck when she didn’t resist. Her only response to becoming a little spoon was a breathy sigh and he liked to imagine it was a contented one.

Holding her close, alone like this, was a happy torment he was rarely able to steal. He wanted to continue holding her tightly to him, feeling her even breathing and the heat of her ass against him, but it was equally tempting to remove the pressure of his arm around her waist in favour of stroking her hair and cheek. His mind provided suggestions of other soft avenues.

‘How can she be so painfully oblivious?’ he wondered. Men and women mingled more freely in one another’s company in the modern era, but the way each of his brothers fought for her attention, for the briefest of her touches or a hug, was beyond what he could imagine was normal for a woman to be oblivious to.

He let a sigh out into her hair without thought. Stiffening in realization at what he’d done, he waited as she fussed and began to shift, momentarily grinding against him before slipping off the pillow and rolling over to press her face to his chest. Trying not to impede her movement, he straightened his legs. He certainly hadn’t expected her to push off the pillow only to nestle herself under his chin.

Pulling the blanket more securely over her, he let his arm rest in the dip of her waist and up her back. “Hmm... this might not be so bad,” he said, trying to sound indifferent. He kissed the top of her head and continued to revel in her sleepy form against him. It was enjoyable until he spied Beelzebub’s jacket hanging from a curl of her bed frame.

The growl that thrummed through him wasn’t intentional. He couldn’t blame Beelzebub’s emotional feedback; from the contentment he felt, it was clear his twin was still eating happily. The jealousy eating him was all his. Why couldn’t she understand how he felt? He wanted her to realize without him having to come out and say it.

“Go to sleep, Belphie.”

He heard the muffled speech against his chest and if he were to have choked off his growl any faster, he’d have had to go back in time.

“I don’t care if I smell like restaurant. Argue with him later. Sleep now.”

How quickly she pegged him to rights, and yet still didn’t understand at all. He let out a faint disapproving grunt to indicate he had heard. He focused on the way her lips had felt through his shirt to distract himself.

It would be so easy to slip into her dreams and smooth the hair back from her face in both domains, letting the sensations ripple back and forth between physical and mental. He could take her to the Celestial Realm and make slow love to her amongst the clouds and sparkling music. Or he could fuck her roughly in the Delvildom’s ocean. No need to breathe there, but it would still muffle her screams as she floated above him with the crashing waves overhead dragging grit across her skin.

He could feel Beelzebub’s suspicion hovering just outside of himself, practically listening in, and he bit back a snarl. Something must have escaped because a warm hand rose up to pet his cheek.

“Sleep.”

The hand slipped back down, and he pulled the blanket back over her, wrapping his free arm around her securely. He had to appreciate her efficiency. She’d effectively silenced an ancient demon, lord of the kingdom she was dropped into, with a lazy pat to the cheek.

Tempted as he was to dip into her dreams, he knew he wouldn’t.  _ Couldn’t _ even. Subtle changes and influences were always so difficult with humans. He could manifest a blue buffalo in their dreams, but each human would have a completely different association with the colour, the animal, the size, anything really. He had a hard enough time getting a bead on her when she was awake without having to contend with her subconscious as well.

Trying to be completely still after her admonishment was not going as well as he had hoped; her fingers kept opening and closing, moving slowly on the chest of his shirt while she tried to find the most comfortable position to sleep.

“Belphegor, if you’re not going to sleep go to the planetarium,” she said, mumbling into him, her breath warm on his skin despite the fabric she required between them.

'The nerve!’ he thought. He wanted to stand up, take his pillow, and let her flop forward with the speed with which he left her. That would teach her a lesson! But he couldn’t bring himself to move. Even when they napped together, there was always someone intruding: walking past, collecting a book from the room, eating near them, or worse joining them. He wouldn’t give this up just yet.

"I want to be together a little longer," he said, whispering it above her, grateful that she couldn’t see his blush.

She hummed contentedly, and wriggled her arm under his, bringing her chest flush against him.

The shirt she was wearing was what she had left in, and he had thought his hand had just missed the thick fabric at her back, but the ease with which the heat of her flesh transferred to him, he was certain she was braless. He pressed his red face into his pillow. Was it possible she was doing this to him on purpose? Maybe he should go in and tweak a dream or two, just to speed things along.

Tempted as he was, he stomped the thought down immediately. It wasn’t too much work for him, when it came to her, but Beel would also never let him live it down. That thought was partially to blame for the altercation earlier. It wasn’t often they'd argue like this, much less come to blows; beyond a direct order, it took a great deal to bring Beel to that particular table. However, it seemed neither of them were willing to give up the new affection they’d found.

Despite Beel’s usual bluntness, Belphegor knew he was too shy to ever actually get anywhere and he had told him so. He hadn’t expected to hear back that she would never want him after his manipulations. How could she really trust him if he was willing to mess around in her dreams?

So that option was out.

Their disagreement had spiralled from there and there was no amount of soup that was going to bridge the gap. Not any time soon.

‘That doesn’t mean I can’t watch though,’ he thought. ‘After all, the others have had so much more time with her, it’s only fair that I catch up in any way that I can.’ He’d peeked in before without issue, not for long, just doing his usual rounds of the house, quelling the nightmares that abounded. What was one more peek?

He dipped into her mind, watching as she went through countless scenes, all of which seemed a bit confused and rushed. Looking around, he was surprised to see the sun high overhead. ‘Definitely a memory of the human world, he thought, but then there was a hand in his tugging him along. He stared in confusion.

“Come play, Belphie!” she said, and her smile lit up the world around them.

She shouldn’t be able to see him. He stared at their hands. He was supposed to be outside of this, looking in. How was she touching him?

Her other hand came up to push the hair out of his eyes. “You okay in there?” she asked.

He nodded dumbly.

And then they were flying. Why were they flying? They were just in a meadow. He knew he wasn’t asleep yet. ‘This is unnatural! This is all wrong. This can't be right.’ A deep apprehension filled him and even the clouds seemed to darken with his anxiety.

“It’s okay,” she said, holding him to her as they floated in place. 

He could tell the clouds were parting again. It was getting lighter. The sensation of sunlight, like hundreds of small kisses were warming his face.

Slowly, lazily, he woke, and for the first time with less apathy than usual weighing him down. Still flooded with warmth and contentment, Belphegor squeezed the human in his arms; she had rolled over in the night to better fit herself against him.

Taking his time, he ran his hand over her shoulder. He skimmed down her arm, over her belly, from the tips of her fingers to as far as he could reach past her hip, and then started the journey back up.

‘Am I awake?’ he wondered, still in shock. He was checking to see if she was real just as much as he was trying to share the contentment by hand. They had napped together before, but he’d never slept like this. Had he been dreaming?

Carefully, he eased the D.D.D. out from under his pillow to check the time. Beel would be surprised if he beat him to breakfast. ‘But if I wake her now we could be early for a weekend breakfast together,’ he thought while he continued to stroke long lines down the length of her body. ‘Nah, let her wake up to my erection throbbing in the cleft of her cheeks.’ He’d let her own dirty thoughts do all the hard work for him.


	8. "Sleep"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone is flustered this morning for one reason or another.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

She woke up pleasantly warm.

She wanted to stay like this all day.

She wanted to drift back into the cozy embrace of sleep, but she had to pee.

She knew the floor would be cold.

She knew she likely wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep if she got up, but most importantly, she could _not_ seem to lift Belphegor’s arm off of her. It was like a safety harness at an amusement park. Completely locked in, he only gave her the slightest range of movement despite her best efforts.

“Belphie, wake up,” she said, her voice well above a whisper for the Avatar of Sloth.

Nothing but even breathing met her words.

“Belphegor, lift your arm.”

Nothing. He was still out cold.

Maybe she could escape if she managed to get her shoulders under his elbow. She tried to wiggle lower and out of his grasp, freezing when he let out a soft moan and squeezed her against him. It was only then that she realized there had been an arm under her as well. It had risen up from flat under her waist to encircle her completely.

Usually she didn’t mind being Belphegor’s pillow, but this was becoming urgent, and she was beginning to notice something else with its own urgency.

‘For fuck’s sake,’ she thought. ‘He would have a hard on.’ Of course it was pressed firmly between the two of them, pulsing. “And here I thought Asmodeus was the menace,’ she said quietly.

Well, she couldn’t really blame him. He was asleep after all and that kind of thing did just happen in the morning. ‘Everyone else who sleeps over manages to keep it to themselves though,’ she thought as her surprise wore off. It didn't matter right now. What mattered was that she had to pee.

“Belphegor,” she said loudly this time, tapping his arm, “Let me up, I have to use the bathroom!”

He grumbled and whined sleepily over her head, bringing his leg to settle over hers instead of moving off.

“Belphie!” His name came out as a squeak rather than anything close to authoritarian.

Hinging his knee over hers, he slid his foot between her legs. It tilted her back ever so slightly, pulling her open to the rest of the bed, and dragging her ass further against him while he held her torso in place.

At the sleepy sigh he let out, she froze like a deer that had heard the snap of a twig underfoot. His hands had remained stationary; it was likely he wasn’t doing it consciously. ‘Purposely or not, this is quite...’ she tried to think of what this was. ‘An amorous hold? Tempting? Hot?’ It was too early for him to melt her brain with teasing, even if he wasn’t awake for it.

Working on keeping her breathing even was no simple task. Even focusing on that made her notice the dip of her shirt and the way her hardening nipples felt the tiniest friction against the fabric. He may be a friend, but she wasn’t dead. She’d have to be dead not to notice how gorgeous each of them was. ‘How terrible would it be if I could free just one hand to thread through his hair and tug while I grind against him?’ she wondered. ‘I could turn the tables and let him wake up to me.’ She was sure that at least one of her hands could reach her clit from here.

‘No, no, he’s asleep!’ She let out her frustration with a huff. He didn’t know what he was doing. She couldn’t take advantage of him like that. “Belphegor,” she said without a hint of pleading left. “Wake up and let me out of bed before I use the pact and wake you up fully.”

“Ugh, Human, why are you awake at this infernal hour?”

“Belphegor, let me up before I pee on you!” She wiggled for full effect.

“I didn’t know you were into that,” he said groggily, lifting his arm without opening his eyes.

Sitting up as best she could, she shook him in her exasperation until he fully disentangled them, and she laughed at the long groan of discomfort he gave. She scrambled off the bed before he could capture her again.

“All right, but pillows shouldn’t be gone for too long!” he said, as he watched her speed away. Clearly, she had forgotten what she was wearing, because he had a wonderful view of her plump ass in the little booty shorts she thought passed for underwear. Maybe he would try this again. Next time he’d go just a little further, and the time after that just a bit more. It was only a matter of time before she either reciprocated or kicked him out of bed. Both could be bent to his advantage.

He heard the shower turn on and he groaned. So much for his pillow returning. It was improbable that she’d let him join her. ‘Not yet anyway,’ he thought with a smile full of mischief.

Well, if she was going to leave him here like this, it really was her own fault. He wasted no time unbuttoning his pants to relieve himself. Licking his palm, he thrust slowly into it, imagining the slickness of the water on her skin and the way her mouth would feel on him. He peppered in the memory of the little gasps she had made when he practically rutted against her in his “sleep,” savouring the shiver she had presented to him when he spread her legs.

He found his release quickly, his hips jerking as he imagined her mouth held wide, her eyes inviting as she stuck out her tongue for him.

The shower turning off had him sighing in frustration. She had no tissues or dirty clothing anywhere nearby. Even the skirt and stockings had disappeared from the floor, along with Beelzebub’s jacket.

‘She brought this on herself, really,’ he thought with a shrug. Milking the last of his ejaculate from himself he wiped it anywhere he thought she wouldn’t see. Under her pillows, near the end of the bed where the sheets were tucked in, and right where she had been laying against him. That one wouldn’t be too unexpected. Let her sheets smell like him until the next wash day. He cleaned the come from between his fingers with the flat sheet, assuming it would end up around her shoulders at some point.

Standing, he tucked himself back into his pants. He was stretching his arms above his head when she returned, fully dressed. A wide yawn hid his disappointment.

She cajoled him downstairs for breakfast with her, only stopping to collect her D.D.D.

* * *

His stretching certainly hadn’t helped her remain cooled from the shower, but as long as he managed to keep his clothes on she’d be fine. She’d caught the barest glimpse of his hip bone above his pants as his shirt had ridden up, while his head had leaned to the side, flaunting his neck and clavicle to her. ‘Get it together, woman,’ she thought. She just needed to get laid, preferably with someone Mammon didn’t want to maim, and then this would go back to being a regular, innocent sleepover like always.

Focusing on the unexpected charm attached to her D.D.D., rather than her slow steps on the stairs, she realized it didn’t match at all with the one she’d collected in London. It derailed her thoughts of barely clothed demons and brought her to a stop on the landing. Looking more closely at it, she jumped slightly when Belphegor’s chin rested on her shoulder. She hadn’t realized she’d stopped walking.

“Definitely Mammon,” Belphegor said, a sleepy murmur in her ear.

Were all demons as touchy as hers? It was getting difficult not to be constantly aroused, even on days when Asmodeus was on his best behaviour. ‘Ugh, he probably has no idea, just get a hold of yourself, woman!’ She hadn’t expected the accidental ambush earlier, but that was no reason she couldn’t put her libido away for breakfast. 

“How can you tell?” she asked, trying not to will him to press his lips to her neck.

He reached around her in a half hug to touch the charm, still maintaining his perch. “It’s a small crow feather,” he said, “and it’s gold, so the two together, there’s no one else it would be.”

How perceptive. Mammon had wanted something for just the two of them, but it had become a trip for the four of them, complete with murder mystery. “That makes sense,” she said, keeping her voice level, “but, let’s hurry before Beel sits down.”

She was tempted to take his hand and tug him along, but settled for grabbing his forearm instead. That seemed safer, less familiar. Did it really matter though since she happily slept against him? 

All eyes were on them as they walked into the dining room. She let go of Belphegor’s arm with a parting smile, and sat down at her assigned seat between Beelzebub and Mammon.

It was obvious that the breakfast crowd was confused by Belphegor’s consciousness during the day, much less this early.

“It’s the weekend,” Mammon said.

“And still daytime hours,” Satan continued, with disbelief clear in his voice.

Belphegor shrugged them off. “I slept extra yesterday, and last night.”

“It’s not good to sleep so much,” Beelzebub said easily, as he had a thousand times before, but this time, the look that passed between them could have melted the table’s candelabras.

She’d have to figure out a way to help them make up once more, preferably without Belphegor punching Beelzebub again. Covertly, she tried to gauge their moods. Belphegor looked down right grumpy instead of his usual apathy. ‘Maybe that’s just from being awake so early?’

Even though Beelzebub looked as angry and imposing as a thundercloud, he still slid the fruit platter towards her, but she noticed he wasn’t eating quite as much as usual. At least he seemed to have retrieved his parka she noted, briefly remembering how it had been as baggy as a tent on her. 

He hadn’t woken her up for their usual midnight snack she realized, as her stomach grumbled; wasn’t he going to come back to her room to eat last night?‘ Maybe this was more serious than she had thought.

“Where is Asmodeus?” Lucifer asked.

Looking at one another and then straight ahead, Leviathan and Mammon didn’t say a word.

“I may have briefly cursed him last night in retribution. He’s probably just pouting,” she said once she had finished chewing and swallowing a bite of pink, fleshy fruit. Its exterior crunched loudly as he waited.

Lucifer raised an eyebrow at her. His concern was strong, but the way she brushed it off with a gentle smile made him believe her. That in itself concerned him, but the girl was no Solomon. She was magicless except for the pacts. Likely, she’d told Asmodeus he wasn’t allowed to use his nightly face cream and he was refusing to come out of his room.

Pushing his chair away, Beelzebub said his thanks for the meal, and left.

This time everyone looked at each other in confusion. The world was upside down: Belphegor was awake and Beelzebub didn’t want to eat.

She turned to Lucifer at the head of the table and his frown was undisguised. “Look into it,” his expression demanded of her.

Slowly, she nodded and worked to finish her bowl.

* * *

Beelzebub walked out the front doors of the House of Lamentation. He just needed some air, and to not have to stare at Belphegor’s smug face this morning.

Arriving at her room for their usual midnight snack, he'd found his twin curled around their human. He'd wanted to pour hot nacho cheese into his ear, but tossed the strewn clothing on the floor into the hamper, and collected his parka instead.

The tired way she’d climbed the stairs, he couldn’t bring himself to wake her. He definitely didn’t want her to see him maniacally pouring hot cheese everywhere when she woke either.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets, considering where he should walk to clear his head.

That train of thought was quickly derailed when he noticed something barring his hand from completely filling his pocket.

What had she left in there? He glanced around, hoping to keep any secret snacks from her hidden. She would be the kind of woman to return a coat with pockets full of snacks. Instead, he turned out his pocket to find a frilly, lace bra in the palm of his hand. He blinked for a moment trying to comprehend what he was looking at. He sat down on the steps and unfolded it to find he was holding out, in front of him, with both hands, a very provocative, red brassiere.

His cheeks nearly matched it shade for shade as he promptly stuffed it back into his pocket. He couldn’t let anyone else catch a glimpse of it. Was this her way of telling him she was interested in being more than work-out buddies? He halted the rise of giddiness he felt. She was very tired last night. It could have been an accident. He’d seen Belphie put his shoes in the refrigerator before, so anything was possible when tired enough. For now, he would hold on to it.

Making his way back to the room he shared with Belphegor, he stashed it away inside his side table. Maybe he would look at it again later when he was sure everyone else was out for the day.


	9. Saturday is Never Quiet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Saturday morning filled with thoughts, avoidance, and ideas.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Saturday was never a quiet day. Well, sometimes it was less chaotic if Mammon had a gig. And today was a blessed gig day, the true day of rest for her. Now if only her giant, grumpy demon would remember it was her rest day. Not that the others respected it either, her weekends were absolutely full with these demonic hooligans.

Hearing the front door close, she decided she would wait for Beelzebub to return in his own time. No point in trying to wrangle an escort so that she could find him when he might return in half the time. Besides, he was mature and confident enough to share his emotions, but that didn’t mean he would want to share in front of one of his brothers. If she approached him, even with Levi entow, it would be awkward, better to wait until their gym time together later.

She made her way into the library and collected the book she had left out. Letting out a contented sigh, she folded her legs under her on the corner of the couch that was not currently accommodating Satan. Stealth, she realized, was going to be of the utmost importance if she planned to get any reading in this morning.

A holler echoed through the corridors, and one of the picture frames slid slightly askew on its hook.

It was no wonder they lived in their own unit. There was no way any of them would have fit in within the walls of Purgatory Hall, or any of the other dormitories for that matter, not if they wanted to be themselves. Then again, maybe it was to protect the academy’s population. She considered that seriously, remembering the destruction to her room over a cup of custard. The only people they bothered here were the resident ghosts, and more often than not it was them terrorizing Mammon.

Placing her tea cup on the floor, she waited for the hollering to get closer. She turned a page and waited a bit longer, squeezing in as much reading in one sitting as she was able. It was clear by now that Mammon had misplaced something and was running late.

The slamming of doors could be heard overhead, and as footsteps came thundering down the stairs, she closed her book around a card, and slid quickly to the floor. It was becoming a practiced movement.

Laying lengthwise along the line of the couch, if Mammon actually was trying to find her, she could be found; the couch didn't dip low enough over its curved feet to hide her completely and she could be seen if he looked for more than a moment.

“Go away, Mammon,” Satan said without looking up from his book.

With the sound of the door closing and the footsteps retreating, she returned to her place back on the couch, and tried to bring her concentration back to her book. She was about to take a sip of her tea when another voice took up the quarrel. Shoulders slumping, she kept her sigh silent as she drank her tea, being sure not to slurp and disturb Satan, before setting it back on the floor. It wouldn’t be long before she was down there again.

She didn’t usually try and read out in the open, but inevitably, some part of this pattern would occur, if not with one set of brothers then another, and if not here then somewhere else.

“UUUGGH so annoyiiiing,” came through the walls and ceiling loud and clear.

‘Ooop! He moved faster than usual today,’ she thought as she resumed her army crawl position on the floor.

The door opened, but there was no sound except for a crabby little huff. Evidently, Leviathan had tried to blow the fringe of his hair out of his eyes again. Adorable. Mammon had likely taken something of his, when he couldn’t find his own, and run off again. There would be some consoling in her future if she wanted to keep the peace, but right now she was determined to get through at least one chapter.

The door closed and she stood again, pausing in her usual pattern to think before she sat. She set her tea aside and sat down directly next to Satan instead. Not close enough to touch him, or move him with her weight, but next to him. She wasn’t looking for trouble after all.

“Don't waste my time,” he said without any inflection, barely raising a finger from the edge of his book.

He hadn’t looked up, his concentration seemed intense, and it had her debating the merits of her newest plan.

“Spit it out, whatever you’re going to say.”

She strummed her fingers over the face of the book in her lap, weighing her options. Her gaze didn’t leave him as she decided.

“I will tell the secret to you,

to you, only to you.

Come closer. This song

is a cry for help: Help me!

Only you, only you can,

you are unique

at last. Alas

it is a boring song

but it works every time.”

She waited for his reaction. It was possible he wasn’t familiar with modern human authors.

“Siren Song,” he said, slowly closing his book to look at her. “I didn’t expect such a request. How shall I die for you, my dear?”

It was always so hard to get on even footing with Satan. He was the most human of all of them, but he was as tricky and fluid as emotion: chaotic and playful at his best; fury and premeditated at his worst. The amusement in his eyes was obvious, but his smile had fallen slightly with his cynical question.

“Let me sit in your lap to read?” she asked boldly. Her expression was open and he would find no ulterior motive in it. 

Clearly, that had not been what he was expecting. “And why, pray tell, would I let you do that?” he asked.

“Because if I’m in your lap your brothers won’t bother me, and then I can read,” she said with certainty. It was essentially inviting his brothers to bother him the closer she came to him, but she also wasn’t asking him to stop reading to go deal with them.

“Or you could try to read somewhere else and I will continue to read uninterrupted.” He looked away towards the fire and she knew she had a chance. They’d spent a good deal of time circling one another, learning each other's immediate tells before they’d fallen into a careful friendship.

“Come on, Satan. Don’t be stingy with your affection,” she said, watching a tinge of pink spread across his cheeks.

He raised his hand to his chest, about to debate her when she beat him to the punch. He needed to be more subtle with his reactions now if he wanted to get his way. “But, Saaatan,” she said, pulling out the big guns: the puppy eyes, “If I’m in your arms, not even Lucifer would bother me.” 

A devil born of Fury from Pride, she was sure stubbornness and spite were a close third and fourth.

It wasn’t that she actively tried to manipulate her demons — she had come to that conclusion quite some time ago — it was that the longer she was with them the easier it was for her to ask them for the things they already wanted to give. More often than not, her requests quelled worries and problems instead of causing them. Maybe it was just the adaptability of humanity at play. 

Satan picked her up without a word and placed her in his lap before bringing his arms back up to read. The only true change was in how he held the book further away to allow room to harbour her.

Making the most use of her space, she lay against him, and opened her own book, content to spend most of her morning there, letting her tea grow cold.

Perhaps an hour had gone by when Satan finally asked her what she was reading. She flipped the book to the cover and flashed him the title: War Children, Child Soldiers, and PTSD: A Longitudinal Study.

“Just a bit of light reading then?” he asked, mostly laughing at her.

It was always nice to feel the warmth that radiated from him when he was pleased. “There are actually quite a number of demon authors writing in the field,” she said. "I shouldn’t have been surprised though given the number of uprisings the History Master has listed so far in class.”

He nodded along, tapping the cover with his finger. “I see you running along with my knuckle-headed brother’s schemes, and standing in line for Ruri-chan figurines, when did you have time to come across this?”

‘Ah there it is,’ she thought. ‘Curiosity with just a hint of suspicion and doubt.’ She retrieved her bookmark: a shiny, new library card. “At the Royal Library,” she said, pleased with herself.

Genuine surprise had him leaning back to look at her more carefully and she debated whether to be offended or not. “You’re welcome to come with me on my next trip if you’d like? I accidentally lost Belphegor in the stacks last time, and he pretended to be asleep so he wouldn’t have to answer me.”

“It’s probably not wise to play Marco Polo in the library,” he said with a grimace.

“I was fairly certain that Belphegor would be able to get to me in time. That’s why I didn’t bother to step softly or try not to make a noise when one of the larger tomes fell on me. Otherwise, he’d have had no idea where I was.” 

His expression said he could see the logic in that, although it was hard to tell with the limited angle she could see. 

“I work with what I’ve got,” she said, impassively.

“Hold it open to the abstract for me?” he asked.

She obliged him and he ‘ _ hmm _ ’d’, free hand on his chin as he read. “Not something I’ve delved into before,” he said with a nonchalance that was unnerving to her. It wasn’t often that Satan admitted to a gap in his knowledge. Not once since she’d met him, actually.

Surprise overruled her instincts and she gaped at him. “How is that even possible?”

“Why would I have?” he asked, his confusion plain. He set his own book down on the side table.

“Well…I mean…You  _ were  _ born in the Celestial War. You  _ were _ a child soldier  _ and _ a war-child.”

His eyes widened slightly at her statement, but she couldn’t read him well enough yet to name his reaction. He always kept himself so tightly underwraps. Was it understanding? Surprise? Anger? Maybe some sadness? She shifted in his lap to prop her elbow up on the arm of the couch. “If that’s the case, you probably haven’t noticed how each of your brothers’ sins could easily be reflections of the stages of grief?”

“That wouldn’t explain Belphegor,” he said, balking at her theory, but his voice was weak, distracted.

Raising a finger, she wagged it side to side between them. “The five stages are all emotions, but there has been conjecture of a sixth: absence. The absence of both feeling and disposition to act. Seems  _ quite _ familiar to me.”

“That’s impossible,” he scoffed. “It’s been millennia since the fall.”

She nodded, and licked her lips, trying not to directly contradict him. She could almost feel the heat of his frustration beginning to swirl under her body. “Yes, but...how many insurrections have you had to put down since then? How long has it been since you climbed through the ranks and became stable lords here?” She marked her page with her card again and watched him think over her hypothesis.

It was disconcerting when he turned his focus on her, shifting her against the armrest further to do so. His gaze was unrelenting as he continued turning over the different facets her theory presented.

“You’re staring,” she said, her words quiet and small with the realization of just how close they were.

“You don't want me to stare at you? I want to. What's the problem?”

He seemed happy, she realized. She had provided him with something new to think about.

She muted the relieved sigh that wanted to escape. At this rate she ought to take up a part time job as a bellows with how often she sighed. Instead of answering she adjusted the collar of his green sweater back to centre. It had pulled along with her when he'd moved her.

“You have a lot of nerve, human,” he said when her hands lingered perhaps a bit longer than decorum allowed.

She put her finger to his lips, but his surprise melted away into confusion when she raised her book back into his view, only to drop her finger away and returned to her reading.

“Having fun, are we?” he asked, his amusement clear. She’d read him correctly and he returned to his book as well. “Happy to see that.”

They continued reading in companionable silence until Leviathan burst back in with a new complaint. This time she didn’t move or even look up from her readings. She felt more than saw Satan turn his head towards the door, and this time, it was wonderful not being on the receiving end of his scathing glare.

“Swim time is at three!” Leviathan said, and fled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The excerpt that you read is from Margaret Atwood's 'Siren Song' found here: www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/32778/siren-song


	10. Work Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC heads to the lower level gym. Beelzebub is having some trouble with weights.
> 
>   
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

She realized she had forgotten to set the alarm on her D.D.D. when a Little Demon hopped up onto her extended slipper and dangled there. It was insistent and she quickly realized its wobbling was due to another little demon boosting it up on their rounded shoulders.

“That looks like my cue to head out,” she said, stretching carefully in Satan’s lap before sitting up. “Thank you for the use of your lap.”

“Until next time,” Satan said, his smile far too charming to be healthy for any human to see on a regular basis. Maybe that was the real reason he was always away, so he wouldn’t fry her circuitry. 

With a small nod, she collected her tea and hastily exited the library, making her way back to her room. Delving into the mystery that Satan presented would have to wait. Today, she was not going to be late for anything! 

‘Work out with Beel, shower, lunch, then swimming,’ she thought, trying to visualize it in her mind’s eye. She’d get Beelzebub to talk about his feelings and help him find a way to make up with Belphegor; and most importantly avoid getting roped in to making anyone else’ lunch. Then she’d try to convince Leviathan to continue breathing during their swimming hour together. BAM! Productive day. By then, Mammon would be home and she could kiss any other carefully laid plans goodbye.

She picked through her wardrobe to find something suitable for the gym. It was difficult not to put on something flashy or flamboyant as it was becoming abundantly clear that Asmodeus had recently "reorganized" her closet. The boundaries there for him had really started to blur. They’d need to have a talk about that soon.

Dressed, and with a small towel and water bottle in hand, she made her way down toward the tomb. Being on the same level as a crypt certainly kept the gym cool, but she didn’t understand how they kept the airflow moving. She couldn’t find any fans. Maybe some sort of magic? Or a lost science she wasn’t familiar with? There were plenty of strange things down there. For all she knew, the ghosts took turns gliding up and down the stairwells to keep the air currents flowing.

‘Now’s not the time to daydream about magic,’ she thought, as she left the last step and opened the door. She needed to get her butt in gear. Lucifer’s disappointment was not pleasant, and would have been incentive enough to help the twins make up if she didn’t already want it herself. Beelzebub had already started without her and she couldn’t let him get away when she had a mission to complete. 

She set down her towel and water bottle next to the door before glancing at the clock. Why is he so early? She was on time, and they usually did warm ups together, but he was already working on leg presses. Today wasn’t even leg day. How long had he been here if he was already on leg presses?

Finding a spot with a mirror, she started the basic routine Beelzebub had planned with her and immediately regretted that Asmodeus had replaced her usual sweatpants with some sort of Lycra fabric. It seemed to breathe well, and wasn’t too thin, so she doubted it was a human textile, but suddenly using the stretching area like this felt much more exposing than before. 

It felt like she was flaunting her lunges and side bends while Beelzebub had nowhere else to look. That just seemed impolite, like walking through someone’s putt line on the golf green.

With effort, she dragged herself out of her paranoia and looked more carefully at her surroundings. Beelzebub was pressing far more weight than usual. He had actually broken a sweat. ‘Looking to tire himself out,’ she thought, ‘classic tactic for dreamless nights and dealing with excess aggression.’ Those were the two main reasons she had joined him in his workouts after she had first been kidnapped and deposited in the House of Lamentation.

“You’re way ahead,” she said, breathing through a butterfly stretch that was just shy of painful. “What’s going on?” Her knees were getting closer to the floor every week.

“Nothing you don’t already know about,” he said, and his voice was as strained as hers was.

“You’re doing a lot more weight than usual,” she said, hoping he would fill in some blanks as he took the time to wipe down the equipment and move to the pectoral machine.

“Ah. Thanks for noticing.” He was staring off into the distance.

Well, she had at least an hour to get him talking. There was no need to bleed him right away. She moved to the wall and leaned in, holding herself up with her fists in the center of her chest, triceps burning. After a time she moved her hands a bit further up the wall, to rest her arms and stretch her calves. She pressed the first heel into the ground.

A ‘ _ whoosh’  _ of air behind her and then a loud ‘ _ clang _ ’ startled her out of the stretch. Turning around, she found Beelzebub staring at the padded handles in his hands which were no longer attached to the machine.

They looked at each other for a moment in surprise before Beelzebub stood up and gently placed the broken equipment near the door.

Wasn’t this demon approved equipment? She tilted her head to the side in question but didn’t ask. Maybe he’d just been using it for too many years and the strain finally snapped it. A shame, but at least she knew it wouldn’t happen with any of her weight levels. Served him right anyway for starting a second lap before she was even done with warm ups.

She turned back to the wall stretch as he made his way to another machine. Doing this alone was boring and she wanted to rush through it. It was more fun when she had a partner to compete with, but she tried to encourage herself nonetheless. ‘Back to the routine!’ Settling herself on the floor she tried to imagine moving as gracefully as Asmodeus. That kind of agility was out of her league, but it didn’t mean she couldn’t work toward something like it. Flat on her stomach and then pushing up with her hands, she arched her back. Slowly, she began to move her legs to try and draw them towards her head as well.

“Form first,” she heard from the other side of the room, Beelzebub’s voice gruff from his own exertion.

She let her legs lower gently back to the floor, and focused instead on the foundation of the stretch. He was right, she had been wobbling. Relaxing back to the floor, after a few more repetitions, she switched back to leg stretches. The variety of movements, and the way the exercises and stretches were organized, was good but it felt ridiculous doing them without her hype man next to her.

It didn’t help that her usual t-shirts had been replaced with “work-out” shirts. Thankfully, she wasn’t popping out anywhere and there were no cut-outs to worry about. Still, Asmodeus was going to get another talking-to. It was one thing to replace her underpants with something functionless, it was another to mess with her outerwear.

Another whoosh and a loud clang sounded behind her. This time there was a crunch that followed. She sat up from her newest compromising position to blatantly stare before getting up to wander over.

There they were, the hand holds of the shoulder press were actually lodged in the ceiling. The stone ceiling. “Beel, I hope demons have warranty clauses for their purchases,” she said, still staring upward as a small shower of grit fell between them.

“They’re old. It’s fine,” he said, but he didn’t look at her.

She began to walk closer, but he held up his hands. “This area is off limits,” he said with finality, and pointed up at the ashlar masonry overhead. She found herself wondering if the house had been dropped over a dungeon here or whether the house had fallen through the planes of hell with the sturdy relic attached beneath it.

Beelzebub made a good point. As sturdy as the ceiling looked, and judging by the height of it, if anything fell, it would probably hurt him, but if she were struck then she’d be lucky to only be concussed. “Fair enough, but if you keep breaking these, I’ll be stuck doing free weights until they're replaced,” she said. Her hands were on her hips, but her smile made it clear she was only teasing.

He nodded, and made his way on to the next machine, looking sheepish.

And damned if he didn’t break every single one of them. Every single one.

‘These demons, honestly,’ she thought, sitting down in what appeared to be the only safe area left: the free weight area.

Beelzebub tossed her the water bottle and towel she’d brought. Nice of him to help her avoid the labyrinth of dead machines and impaled structures.

“Take turns?” she asked.

He looked like she had just thrown her water on him. “What?”

“I do one set and you spot me…and then you do a set and I watch for form?” she said slowly, uncertain how to respond to his question. This wasn't something out of the ordinary for them.

She’d managed to learn how to converse with an ancient demon, neé angel, with clear PTSD, and survivor’s guilt, but he and Belphegor were so dependent on one another that their fight was throwing off everyone’s usual rapport.

“Hey.” She stood up when he didn’t answer her, off in his own world. “Earth to Muscles,” she said, tapping him on the head twice.

He finally looked at her like he saw her, and she poked him in the chest. “Where’s your head at?” she asked him.

“Sorry, I’m just distracted. Guess I’m still hungry from breakfast.”

When his stomach gurgled at her she gave it a little rub. “I can hear that. Is Belphie’s bad mood affecting your stomach that much?”

He ‘ _hmm_ ’d’ at her.

“Helpful,” she said woodenly, not impressed with the guessing game. Beelzebub was usually more forthcoming. “Alright, well, I’m starting my hammer curls so spot me and tell me all about your fight.” She didn’t wait to hear his weak refusal. She didn’t give him time.

“When Belphie feels bad, I can feel it: drowsiness, lack of appetite, sometimes I can’t eat at all," he said, watching carefully as she found her posture on the bench, weights in hand. "Sometimes I feel so angry and it’s not even mine.”

She listened and nodded, adjusting when he poked her elbow closer to her side, until he eventually took the dumbbells from her.

While she was still warming up, he had set the weights for his squat and press, and they moved over to a platform for his turn. The tall ceiling finally made sense as she watched him step up onto a platform to lift the wagon wheel sized weights. ‘What is that bar even made of?’ she wondered as she counted for him, watching for any form issues as he squeezed out words.

“When I’m upset with Belphie—” Beelzebub said, his words quick as he puffed out a stream of air, “he gets the usual:—” He breathed out forcefully with another lift before continuing. “Ravenous, energetic, can’t sleep…” Another breath in and another out with a lift. “But if we’re both unhappy—” His arms weren’t yet showing fatigue. “Or angry—” Another lift, and he slowly brought the barbell back down until he was squatting again. “Or sad—” The muscles in his legs bulged with the strain. “Everything tends to echo and amplify between us.”

Three more heavy lifts, and she didn’t press him for more information during them. It was clear he was reaching his limit.

“It gets pretty awkward for some more...intimate feelings as well," he said, gritting out the words.

“That’s ten,” she said. “What magic do the weight machines use to mimic  _ that _ kind of weight?” she asked. She didn’t hold back her amazement. Maybe they captured miniature black holes? It had been months but simple magics they took for granted still surprised her.

Beelzebub set the barbell down, breathing harder than she’d seen him breathe over a lift before, but he smiled at her question. “Astral.” 

His smile disarmed her and she couldn’t help but smile back. Astral, that was a new one. “Like astral projection...or?” She almost felt bad questioning him when he was still trying to catch his breath, but the subject seemed to be lifting his mood.

“You can power them up by creating a small point of destruction on this plane,” he said, then backpedalled on seeing her perk up with curiosity. His hands were out in front of him once more as if that could stop her. “Just leave it to me though!” He looked over at the graveyard of machines. “The strength of the spell depends on actual strength and I wouldn't want you getting sucked in. Even Satan has trouble with it and he has all kinds of shortcuts.”

She scrunched her lips to one side in a show of weak displeasure. It was only for show, so that he’d know she wouldn’t attempt it on her own. Placating Beelzebub helped distract her from the fatigue-tremble in his thighs. What she wouldn’t give to massage that out for him. 

Tossing her unused towel to him, she set up her own weights, grateful for the chance to get her blush under control. Lucifer should have warned her that the greatest hurdle in making her soul shiny was having to be in close proximity to his brothers. 

Sitting on the bench, she collected her weights and held them over her own thighs, waiting for her spotter. Maybe the pope was still selling indulgences on the downlow and she could get a free pass just this once. Beelzebub made his way over, face still pink but no longer dripping sweat. With a practiced motion, he straddled the bench and scooted closer to her as she started her shoulder presses. His hands hovered just around her wrists, ensuring she wouldn’t drop them or snap anything.

“I should apologize,” she said softly, the weights not yet straining to her.

His hands failed to move with hers, brushing down her forearms before he returned to position. “You mean with me and Belphie? You don’t have anything to apologize for. It’s just between the two of us” he said.

She watched him in the mirror, they should have had this conversation later, when he wasn’t her personal shadow, cast much larger but still nearly wrapped around her. If only they didn’t procrastinate for hundreds of years, then she’d be able to procrastinate too. Leaving this alone, she knew they wouldn’t solve it until she’d been dust for generations. It was their pattern. She completed a few more presses, considering her next words carefully. “Perhaps…I should stop napping with Belphegor then,” she said, licking her lips and trying to breathe as her arms began to shake with strain.

Silently, Beelzebub’s hands engulfed her wrists, but he didn’t take the full weight of the dumbbells from her; he let her struggle through the last rep to the fullest before he took them away.

“I suspect he has been enjoying our naps a little more than…” she said, scrunching up her brows at her reflection while she tried to think of a polite description.

He looked down at her wrists, where his hands had come back to rest, and he gently palpated them and her forearms. When she leaned back into his chest, he sat up straighter. Tense.

Sometimes it was nice how touchy her demons were. Enjoying Beelzebub’s help with her cramping arms was a perfect example. She watched lazily in the mirror, his figure, broader and taller than her in every aspect, he enveloped her without trying.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, but his eyes didn’t meet hers in their reflection.

“Beeel,” she said, exasperation bleeding into her tone. “Don’t be like that.” She sat up and away from him and he dropped her arms like he had been burned.

Turning around, her knees on the bench between his legs, she looked up at him properly. She reached for him without thinking, her hand pushing some of his sweat plastered hair off of his forehead. “You two have such messy emotions, and all I want to do is cheer you both up. So, say what would make you happy, or at least less miserable? Whether it bothers Belphegor or not!”

He looked so shy. How could she not want to hold and console him? ‘And his hot, sweaty muscles. No! Focus!’ she thought. Beelzebub was such a sweetheart and he needed her empathy right now, not her pervy, sex deprived brain.

“T-.-. .-.-.e. .-.-.-.m. .-.-.ur..-av--.-.it,” he said, his words like a deep rumble from inside the earth. 

She rested her hands on his shoulders, trying to make him look at her, or at least direct sound towards her instead of away. “Beelzebub, you’ll have to speak up. I can’t hear you when you talk at Infernal levels.”

“Tell me I’m your favourite,” he said looking at her finally.

His eyes were so beautiful up close. She didn’t know how she didn’t drown in their purple every time she saw them. “You know I don’t have favourites, Beel,” she said, her tone a weak admonishment.

Closing his eyes, he looked like she had just told him the grocer would never sell eggs again.

“Hey,” she said softly. She stroked the line of his jaw with her thumb to coax him into looking at her. “If I did have favourites, you would definitely be a front runner.” It was a weak attempt at being cheeky and sweet, anything to make him stop looking at her like she’d just kicked Puppy-Beelzebub.

And then he was kissing her. There had been no warning before he leaned down and captured her lips; it was soft and slow, testing, and gentle like he always was with her. Her eyes closed on instinct, only the barest feeling of his fingertips at her cheekbone told her where he was. She hadn’t even noticed his other hand trace along her waist until he pulled her closer. 

It ended as quickly as it had begun. He had pulled away, and it was only her hands on his chest that remained. 

“Thanks,” he said and rested his forehead briefly against hers. “Now I can rest and eat some food!”

She opened her mouth to say something but closed it again quickly. Did his ability to relax now mean  _ that _ had only been a show of affection for him? Some sort of confirmation that they were close? “That’s good,” she said with a small smile. Maybe it was a demon thing? They were all very touchy. She was blinking too fast. 

In sync, the moment gone, they both moved from the bench. He tossed her the small towel she had come in with. “You should get going, Leviathan will pitch a fit if you’re late again.”

“Oh, no! You’re right,” she said, scrambling to grab her water bottle and head out the door.

She rushed out, careful of the new “décor”, and left Beelzebub staring at the destruction he had wrought on the weight room.


	11. Release Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unexpected detour on the way to the pool.
> 
> :O
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Her trip back to her room had been uneventful, and she was grateful for that. It always took forever for her to warm up in the gym when she didn’t have someone to compete with and it slowed her entire schedule down. That she kept pausing in her task to consider the kiss she’d shared with Beelzebub didn’t help either. She could still feel the pressure of his arm around her waist and it made her toes curl. These demons!

She picked out a swimsuit and, thankfully, it didn’t seem to have mysteriously shrunk in size or changed its colours overnight. A quick rinse and lunch and then she’d make a dash for the pool.

But it was even harder not to think about the kiss while she showered off. Was it just a one time thing? Comfort? A thank you? It was probably innocuous. She was still a little riled up from Belphegor’s newest form of “struggle snuggle.” ‘There had to be a better term for that for him to use.’ It was entirely possible she was making something out of nothing.

Was she just imagining what she hoped to find?  _ That  _ was a more dangerous avenue of thought. Even if a mutual attraction wasn’t imagined, she probably shouldn’t pursue it if she was just going to leave, but somehow the idea of that hurt her heart more than if she was just imagining it. It would be strange to go back to her world where polite handshakes could be the only physical contact received in a day. She turned the shower to cold and got on with what was supposed to have been a quick rinse.

After patting herself mostly dry she hopped into her suit and bundled up with a fluffy robe. Slippers on, and a new, larger towel in hand, she made her way around the corner to the kitchen. ‘Full steam ahead!’ she thought. ‘Today I’m going to be productive! No distractions today! No being late!’

She was fairly certain that everyone was either out, Satan, or cloistering themselves, so she didn’t need to worry about company for lunch just yet. Satan certainly wouldn’t be bothering her anytime soon; she’d seen the collection he’d brought to the common room. The temptation to grab a light snack and beat Leviathan to the pool was becoming a more attractive prospect by the minute. ‘I might actually get to use the hot tub for once,’ she thought as she opened the fridge and located a few unusual looking vegetables to slice and snack on.

The crisper had been converted to the “Human Safe Bin” and it was always interesting to see what would appear. She would still wait on whatever that meat was. It might be “safe” but it didn’t look digestible.

She sliced and snacked as she went until she deemed it time to finish grazing. Fist full of sliced vegetable in hand, she munched as she walked, starting her short journey towards the pool wing. It had come as no surprise to her that Leviathan’s room was the last bedroom before the second wing of the house began. That put him closest to the pool and she couldn’t imagine him letting anyone be between him and the water.

Two Little Demons caught her attention as they scurried past and down the hall. ‘Off and up to mischief, likely’ she thought with a smile.

A crash behind her made her turn, blood radish slice still half in her mouth and half out. ‘Or maybe they’ve already done their mischief.’ Louder smashing followed and it quickly became clear that it was coming from Asmodeus’ room.

“Asmo?” she called out as she got closer. All noise from the room stopped. “Asmo, is everything okay in there?”

She had her answer. She was already inside, and the door slammed closed behind her as he held her up against it.

“You are the cruelest mistress I have ever known,” he said, and his voice was anguish itself. He was a mess: dishevelled hair around his horns, chipped polish, rumpled clothing. Thankfully, he was still dressed, but he looked like a mad man, his wings had sprouted and torn through his pink shirt, and his jacket, scarf and shoes were long gone.

When she put her hands against him his face crumpled on itself with the force of emotion. A burble of pain echoed from his chest into her hands. Her snacks were likely strewn across the hallway carpet, but she couldn’t bring herself to worry about them now that he was almost crying in front of her. “Asmo, what’s wrong?” she asked, her concern clear and innocent.

For a moment, the look he gave her was savage. The pink that glowed in his eyes was tinged darker as if he was a god of bloodlust too.

She heard the claws of his feet digging into the wooden floor boards beneath them. He could slaughter her if he wanted. He could tear out her larynx before she could ever utter a command. So she hugged him to her instead, petting his hair, resting against him cheek to cheek.

“Why would you curse me like this?” he asked, bringing his lips to her throat. He licked and nipped at her exposed skin, and though her wet hair didn’t cover much, the thick lapels of her robe were in his way, barring him from more. He pulled at the ties of her robe, tearing it off her and tossing it to the floor.

His clothed body pressing back against her and she held back a hiss of surprise. It felt like there was an actual fire in him, almost enough to scald her through her bathing suit. “Tell me what’s happened,” she said as calmly as she could, feebly trying to stroke his back.

“You know exactly what you’ve done, you evil woman,” he said, growling in her ear as his hands wandered and slid over her body.

It was difficult not to push her hips flush against him when he grabbed her ass. She felt her breathing quicken to nearly match her speeding pulse.

He kissed her harshly, his tongue in her mouth without warning. There was no wrestling for dominance; he plundered everything he desired, including the little noises he wanted from her.

She heard a soft ‘ _ snick _ ’ and felt one of the straps from her bathing suit disappear. She felt his nails, felt the petals of swimsuit fabric skimming her legs and falling to the floor in pieces. His mouth covered everywhere he cut bare, sucking and claiming the skin, leaving pomegranate red stamps as he moved across her flesh.

“Asmo?” she asked, but her voice barely made a sound. She couldn’t hear herself around the blood pounding in her ears.

“More, give me more of your touch,” he said, bringing his mouth back up to nip along her jawline.

With the press of his leg between hers, she raised her leg to his waist without thought, allowing herself just the slightest amount of the pressure she needed. “Asmo, tell me what’s wrong,” she said trying to keep the moan from her voice, trying to keep from rocking against him.

Withholding didn’t last long. She arched desperately against him, her small cries no longer stifled by his kisses when he finally cupped her breasts, teasing her nipples while, like a man starved, he mouthed everywhere he could reach.

‘Fuck.’ She didn’t care what was wrong. She just wanted him to keep going. It had been so long since she’d come hard, or come at all with someone else. She wanted to be embarrassed by how quickly she was closing in on her orgasm just by grinding against him, but couldn’t hold on to the thought.

Asmodeus’ hand came around her thigh, hiking it just a little higher, pressing her against the seam of his red pants. The material was rough and it was a small mercy that his belt was missing.

Her consciousness survived another punishing kiss, and she truly thought she might lose herself in just that, but his lips were gone as quickly as they’d come. In exchange, he pressed the thumb of his free hand against her clitoris, letting her rock against him. It wasn’t possible to withhold the moan he elicited.

‘Just a little more,’ she thought, but every time he gave her more he also took away. The hand that had pressed against her clit quickly left to hold her against the door by the throat as he dipped to suck a nipple into his mouth.

She whined with want as he moved slowly now, languidly tracing patterns across her chest as he moved from breast to breast. “Asmodeeeuus,” she said, her words sounded petulant and needy even to her ears.

Silencing her with his mouth on hers, his hand returned below, dipping a single digit into her wet heat. He was coaxing her closer and closer with each crook of his finger.

And he stopped. Leaning in, his horns dragging along the door, he hissed in her ear, “Release me.”

Her head was a mess. ‘Why?’ was all she could think. “I won’t keep you in a pact you don’t want,” she said, choking out the words. Fuck she wanted to cry, there was just too much. She looked up at the ceiling, willing away the tears.

Slowly, he lowered her leg. Too fucking slowly he slid back in to her and added a second finger, gently brushing against her clit with the pad of his thumb.

“I am happy in our pact when you aren’t cursing me for millions of years,” he said dangerously, as his fingers withdrew again.

She was breathing heavier than she wanted to be. This wasn’t making sense. She needed to think clearly.

Lifting her with his hands around her ribs, he tossed her onto the bed like a doll, only to pull her down the bed towards him afterward. He straddled her thighs, quickly tucking her arms into the hollow of her back, holding her there. “Now, release me,” he said, keeping her legs in his vice grip, “or I will ensure you suffer a fate worse than mine.”

“I don’t understand,” she whined. Fuck, he’d edged her so close. She heard his zipper and felt him press the head of his cock against her clit. So warm. Gods she might pass out from lack of air.

She jerked upwards for more contact but his legs and a single hand on her hip kept her from moving at all.

Toying with her, he slid his cock up and down her slit, never letting her move. “Oh, I think you understand exactly what you did.”

“Asmodeus!” she cried out in frustration.

“Just say the words,” he said, sliding into her inch by delicious inch, “Say the words and I will fuck you like you want.”

“Tell me what to say,” she said, begging. She was desperately clutching the bedding under her as her walls tried to flutter around the intrusion.

“Say, Asmo, I relinquish my command to not touch yourself.”

“I...But, Asmo.”

“No, buts,” he said, his voice light as he traced a fingertip around her swollen clitoris.

“It should have only been five hours," she said, panting heavily. "How can you be so cruel over five hours?” She tried hopelessly to buck against him as she whined.

There was silence in the room except for their breathing.

“Five hours?” he asked.

“Yes, just five.” She couldn’t even focus on the room around them, there was nothing but the feeling of his touch.

He removed his hands from her, only his legs still clamped around her thighs to keep her in place. “I thought you said five eons.”

“For fuck’s sake, Asmo,” she said as she groaned and tried not to laugh. Ugh, she felt him even more when she laughed.

Breathing less strained now, she tried to keep the pleading from her words, “Asmo, I rescind my previous order not to touch yourself; now please touch me.”

“With pleasure, mistress,” he said as he began to rock inside her. “I’m going to make you come harder than you’ve ever come before.”

* * *

She was dazed. He hadn’t lied.

And she had received two encores after that.

His kisses were sweet now as she tried to escape his embrace. “Swimming can wait,” he said. “Stay with me.”

“You’re insatiable!”

“Yes, now come back to my side and I’ll show you exactly how insatiable I can be.”

“I’m going to be late as it is,” she said, trying to find her robe.

“I thought we could have some real fun. Too bad...”

She did pause to consider that, but the torn robe she spied at the door reminded her of her original agenda. Finding her towel she wrapped it around herself and gave up her slippers as lost to the void. “Goodbye, Asmodeus”

The soft grumble that left him and vibrated up into her feet might’ve been another invitation, but when she showed no understanding he quickly returned to English. “Alright, well, take two and let me know how you are in the morning.”

She stopped half way out the door, “I didn’t think we had any aspirin in the house?”

“Cocks, darling. Take two if you want to finish getting that out of your system.”

“Ugh, Good bye, Asmo!” she said and closed the door.

“Wear the pink one!” she heard as she sprinted back to her room for the third clothing change and rinse of the day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Evil Author Laughter*
> 
> Sorry for the surprise! But don't worry, the show will go on.


	12. Swimming with Leviathan - Besties Forever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Important pact bonding and down time
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

A very, very, very cold shower later, she stepped on to the bath mat to survey the damage in the mirror. Her cheeks were still flushed and the hickeys stood out starkly against her skin. She looked thoroughly kissed but at least her legs still held her up right. That had to count for something when it came to Asmodeus.

Digging through the unfamiliar clothing in her underclothes draw, she found "the pink one” and shimmied the bathing suit on. A quick check in front of the vanity and she was satisfied that the thicker straps and higher cut managed to hide everything she wanted away from prying eyes. For once she might actually have to thank Asmodeus for rifling through her drawers.

A new towel in hand, one that didn’t smell like toe-curling sex, and she was back out the door making a swift jog to the pool. ‘I can think about Beel and Asmo later. Levi is going to be pissed if I’m late again and I’ll never hear the end of it.’

Almost home free, and who should step out into the hall but Belphegor. Of course. This is just her luck now.

“Where are your slippers?” he asked, watching her approach barefoot.

“I lost them,” she said with a smile, trying to dodge around him without breaking her stride, but that was too much to hope for.

It felt like molasses. The air felt heavy and thick as she tried to move through it.

“You lost them?” he asked doubtfully, his finger just barely grazing her shoulder.

“I’m sure they’ll turn up,” she said, still sort of in motion.

He seemed to believe her, but just as she thought she would be free of the heaviness he circled her. “How did you manage to lose your robe?” he asked.

‘Can he guess from there?’ she wondered. ‘How long has he been home? Did he hear us?’ She had to give that one some thought. She didn’t want to lie to him, but she hadn’t quite sorted everything out for herself either yet. Extra information without necessity or direction in this household meant chaos. Chaos for weeks if not longer.

“I think I left it next to the door? I’m not entirely sure, but I’m late to meet Levi!”

“You sure seem motivated,” he said, his words drawled almost as slowly as she moved, while he stared down at her. He was tall, but when she was slowed like this he might as well be a giant.

“Belphie,” she was trying not to whine about being trapped. ‘This day is already too much. Take pity,’ she tried to say with her eyes. “Let me go already. I can’t be late again. I’ve been late the last three weeks in a row.”

He just continued to look her over and she gave up trying to move. It was too tiring to fight against him, but she resolved to stay on her feet at least.

“Yes, but usually, you don’t look like this when you’re on your way to the pool,” he said, tugging gently at the towel around her form.

Following his gaze from her bare feet and back up, he looked like he was going to touch her lips and she tried not to draw her lower lip in to hide it. Her trepidation warred with her impatience as she watched the two Little Demons leading a cheer for her further down the hallway.

She wanted to laugh at the ridiculousness of this all. Maybe she should just cancel swimming all together, today had already been enough.

“I don't want to deal with this right now...” he said with a lazy shrug.

The viscous jello of the hallway abated slowly, and he continued walking past her, likely on his way to the kitchen.

She waited to heave a sigh of relief until she made it to the pool room door. Was he mad? He seemed more puzzled than angry, but it was hard to untangle his petulance from his meaning sometimes.

Asking Lucifer for a key to lock her room with would be high on her list of priorities for later this evening. Maybe some proper time alone without unexpected demons lying in wait would be good for her brain. Dashing from place to place might not be avoidable, but having no one there when she returned would give her a chance to sort out her uncomfortably complicated pacts and emotions, or at the very least give her a chance to have dibs on her own bed.

* * *

Leviathan did not look pleased. Up to his knees in the smaller, warm pool with his arms crossed, she was sure his foot was tapping under the water.

“One minute late!” he said.

“Ugh, I’m sorry, Levia-chaaan,” she said and tossed her towel to the side.

“I think you mean, ‘Thank you Levia-chan, King of Otaku and Water, for swimming with me and waiting around.’”

She ignored him and walked to the edge of the pool to splash in next to him.

His blush was adorable. He always seemed happy when she ignored his request for praise. Odd, but if he was happy with it then so was she.

“Sorry, I was supposed to be early. I even skipped lunch to get here before you, but Asmo and Belphie slowed me down.”

Ooooh, the envy that rippled off of him was palpable. She could have easily found him with her eyes closed with the energy that shook and foamed the water directly around him.

Without concern, she pushed him over, and he flailed dramatically, crashing into the water behind him. She dropped to her knees and followed, carefully treading water as she avoided skinning her legs on the gradient bottom.

“H-Hey! Quit that! Don't be mistaken if you think that makes me happy!” he said when he surfaced, and she immediately tried to topple him again.

She didn’t follow when he properly fled, resurfacing to glare at her from the deep end. Not that he needed to surface at all; he could breathe just as easily underwater. If it weren’t for that, she was sure he would have died every day that she’d joined him in the pool. Normie flesh, apparently, was his kryptonite and bathing suits hid very little of it.

“Then quit being jealous. If you want to,  _ you _ can go be bothered by the two of them while  _ I _ wait for you!” she said as she swam closer, preparing to dunk him again. “Let’s go find another book like the one that swapped Satan and Lucifer, then you can try and dodge them while I eat a proper lunch and lounge in the hot tub.”

He disappeared under the surface again before she could catch him.

Looking around, she couldn’t see him anywhere. The water had become as still as glass, not even lapping at her, before the whole of the water in the pool began to turn.. ‘That’s new,’ she thought. Had he magicked away?

‘Cold air! Why is everything cold air?’ She was out of the water, airborne and legs kicking uselessly, then plummeting quickly back down to the water. “You sneak!” she shouted. “Don’t be tossing your mistress!”

Her shrieks were short lived. Expecting a stupendous reverse belly flop, she was pleased to have been carefully caught and released back into the water. Catch and release at its finest.

“HA! Can you see how strong I am now? I AM OTAKU! HEAR ME ROAR!”

His victory dance was something for the storybooks, and she laughed with him. “All hail King Leviathan: tosser of weak, innocent humans!”

He rolled his eyes at her, and they continued to enjoy their time by floating and talking about nothing, mostly nerdy nothing. It was nice. Calm.

She knew he didn’t hate being here, even though he usually hid under the water. He often reminded her of a crocodile with its eyes just above the water line, but he kept inviting her to swim and so she kept joining him.

Finding new ways to coax him out of his hermit shell, while still being in a comfortable environment for him, had been good for their friendship. Floating nearby, they could talk about anything without having to ever look at one another, and when he got too overwhelmed, it was fine for him to duck under the water for a bit. Nothing strange about that. After all, that’s what they were here to do: swim.

Today, she found herself underwater more often than he did, enjoying the sound of nothing. After a time, she made her way back to the shallow end, reclining on the gradient so that only her legs were in the water.

Her crocodile floated over silently. “What’s gotten into you today?” he asked.

A horrible wash of red spread across the surface of her skin. He just had to phrase it that way, didn’t he? She placed the back of her hand across her eyes, damselling it up. “Teach me the ways of the Otaku, Oh Levi the Great, so that I too may bar trespassers from my door,” she said.

“Hmm. Training, you need,” he said. “Teach you, I cannot.”

She blew a raspberry in his general direction, and in the following companionable silence she scooted her way back into the water. Hooking his pinky in hers, she made him into a personal anchor to keep her from beaching herself. She heard him sputter under the water, but he didn’t pull away.

When he resurfaced, she asked him with the utmost seriousness, “Leviathan, will you be my Valentine this year?”

He disappeared and slipped his pinky from hers.

Unanchored, she scalloped the water with her hands. She pushed a little further from the shallows, floating on her back and waiting.

“W-Why?!” he asked, his voice coming from the other end of the pool.

“Why not?”

“NO! I won't succumb to such normie tactics!”

“Levi, be my Valentine, and rescue me, so I don’t have to be someone else’s.”

He was right next to her before she knew it. Only the ripples and inflow of current around her gave his silent approach away. ‘Always wanting things that others might have,’ she thought to herself, ‘and yet still so gun shy.’

Roughly even with his hips now, she realized he was standing, and she used his solid body to propel herself away, jabbing him in the belly to create her own momentum.

“A-Ha! Touchy-touchy, no no!”

“Say, yes,” she said wearily.

“You want help from me? Only if I get something in return.”

“Say yes or they’ll bother us both, and we’ll never get to sit down for the raid on Tuesday.” She was sure she had his full attention now as he was wading closer.

“Do you actually like m... You know what? Never mind.”

'This must be how sea otters feel when they spin,' she thought idly. Rolling over in the water to look at him properly, she smiled at him. “Of course I like you, Leviathan. You’re my truest friend,” she said, and right then she was sure she meant it. His envy could sometimes get in the way, but he always did his best to be a good friend.

He snorted.

“I’ll make you a card that says I think you’re Dino-Mite!”

“Laaaaame.”

“And a chocolate.”

Silence except for the lapping of water at the edges of the pool filled the room.

“You mean it? Like they do in anime?” he asked, looming over her with interest.

“Yes, just like in anime. I’ll even properly ask you to accept it,” she said, rolling her eyes at him. Her smile was still warm. “But only one chocolate!”

“You're such a boss!” he said. The excitement he had was overflowing and frenetic. It kept his hands moving in wide animated gestures as he talked. “Like, final-boss status. Ah, but not in a bad way! I mean...! GAH!”

She laughed and they both submerged for different reasons.

When she stood up again she didn’t see him, but she knew he could hear her. “Levi, I think I’m going to head in early. I’m really tired today.”

“Ah!” she shouted when he breached the water next to her. Apparently, it was her turn to be surprised now. “Don’t just pop up out of nowhere!”

“I can’t help it that your normie senses are so dull.”

She sighed and looked at the door. ‘Maybe I’ll nap before prepping dinner,’ she thought.

“Hey what’s going on with you?” he asked again. He was looking at her with concern.

“Can I have a high five?” she asked, her voice much smaller, and more tired than she had ever used with him before. Where was the woman who had just bullied him into Valentine’s Day a moment ago? She needed that energy back. The day was only half over. 

He raised his hand for a moment before lowering it hastily. “Troublesome, normie,” he muttered and he hugged her instead.

She froze. This was not something Leviathan did.

“Don’t let it go to your head. I’m pretending you’re two-dimensional.”

“Thanks,” she said, resting her head against his shoulder, not daring to move her hands from his chest lest she scare him away. He was more intuitive than she gave him credit for. For him, the ultimate friendship culminated in a solid high five, but he knew for her it was different.

For the first few moments it felt nice, but all too quickly it felt too nice. This was Leviathan. Her Levia-chan. Mr. No-touchy. But he looked so good with his hair swept out of his eyes. She wanted to run her hands all over him and make him blush in the most terrible of ways. “I-I have to go,” she said, and broke away from the hug as carefully as she could.

She strode purposefully away toward the colder, deep pool. ‘Damn it, Asmodeus!’ she thought.

It was a given that she would eventually give in to his charm. That seemed like an eventuality of the pact, but she didn’t expect it to impact the way she responded to the rest of her demons.

Dropping in feet first, she held her breath, willing the heat in her body to go down. ‘One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand… did something just touch my foot?’ Her eyes opened blearily under the water. Nothing. She closed them again. ‘Six one thousand… Oh no, there it is again there’s something in the water!’ The air bubbled out of her and she shot up to the surface.

“Help! Now!” she said as soon as her head bobbed out of the water, fear still propelling her forward. Who knew what Leviathan kept in the pool when she wasn’t here. It was probably filled with baby monsters, timingila fry or tiny iku-turso that he kept as a side hobby. Babies or not, with her hardiness even a snapping turtle was out of her league. 

She’d barely finished speaking, it was impossible to see from under her hair and the water in her eyes, but she knew she was out. Coughing, she tried to make sense of what was holding her. ‘Leviathan’s tail?’ He usually only used it to make waves at her, or knock her off balance, but he’d fished her out with it. 

Setting her down on her feet, the tail slackened around her waist. She steadied herself with a hand against his bicep and the other clutching the tail still pressed against her belly. It was obvious now that Leviathan wanted to shy away from her. His hands fidgeted with one another as he avoided her eyes.

“You’re okay,” he said.

It was a statement, but she knew he was looking for reassurance. Her knees were about to give out. She swallowed hard, knowing she looked terrified and miserable. He only confirmed it when he hugged her again.

She expected the gesture to give her strength, instead she fell to pieces in his arms, covering her face and crying. “I’m sorry. I’m ruining swim day,” she said between sobs.

Robotically, he patted her back a few times, likely trying to find anything in his encyclopedic memory of games that would have a walk-through for crying women.

It was both frustrating and a relief when he decided to scoop her up and march out of the pool with her. It was hard to have so little real agency here, but, somehow, she was still expected to be fine, to be an ambassador for her species even. Nothing here was ever simple.

The sound of the doors closing behind them, the familiar bubbling of the aquarium, and the click of a door lock let her know where they were even before Leviathan stepped into his tub with her.

* * *

Sitting down, he nestled her between his limbs. This was no different than if he’d filled the tub and had Henry swimming around his legs. ‘No different,’ he thought, calming his nerves with the mantra. ‘This is the safest place.’

“I’m just messing everything up,” she said, her face still covered by her hands as she continued to weep on him.

Now this, he understood. This was where he lived: crushing doubt. He petted her wet hair, more gently than she often ruffled his. “Hey, you’re going to get snot on me!” he said, trying to make her laugh.

It didn’t work, she only cried harder, curling up even tighter around his tail.

‘Strike one,’ he thought as he tried to control the full body blush she was inducing. He just had to make sure he didn’t pass out. ‘Deep breaths.’ He tried to use his tail to tilt her a bit more upright and get a better look at her. “Hey, hey, I-I didn’t mean it. It’s okay,” he said. “Come here, t-take this towel. Wipe your face.” He’d seen Lucifer deal with enough crying angel children back in the old days. This couldn’t be any harder, right?

She snuffled as she dabbed at her face.

“There’s my big, bad human,” he said when she handed the towel back.

Her face started to crumple again.

'Strike Two!' He took the towel from her. “H-Hey, as your pact-demon I command you not to cry.”

She did giggle at that.

“Better,” he said, muttering the praise to her as he adjusted her so her elbows weren’t poking him quite so badly. “Now, your only job is to make your breathing slow and even. Got it?”

She nodded against him and he exaggerated his breathing until she matched the relaxed rhythm he set. 

It seemed like she almost had everything cried out. ‘How long had she been holding that all in for?’ he wondered. It wasn’t like her to cry. He’d seen her with angry tears before, but as much as it set off his flight response, he’d learned they were no different from the way fish secreted extra ammonia out of their gills when they swam too hard. This, whatever this was, was different, almost like she was a figurine poorly attached to its base and wobbling.

“There was a thing in the water,” she said, her voice croaky.

He let his head fall back and  _ thunk _ loudly against the wall of the tub. “Are you serious?” he asked, shaking them both with his laughter as he waited a moment for her reply. “You were afraid of Henry?”

This time they both laughed and he was painfully relieved to hear it. The way she lay heavily against him, her arms still limp at her sides, it seemed as though she had no energy left at all. If she had enough to laugh then she would be fine, right?

“Thanks, Levi.”

“Whatever, Normie.” It was hard being so close to her. He could feel the damp heat between them and the cold of her skin that pressed against him whenever he moved.

There was a comfortable silence between them now that he was loath to break. He shifted his leg slightly to try and dampen the anxious tremor that was beginning to move them.

“Levi?”

“Yeah?” he asked, trying to concentrate on her question rather than the tightness in his chest or the way her scent was coating his throat. It felt pleasant, but overwhelming, like he was in the center of a most ripe flower, like he was breathing her in. 

“Can I ask one more favour?” She sounded so plaintive. Exhausted.

‘Anything,’ he thought and ‘No!’ this was already too much. “Y-You’re already using my tail like a teddy bear. What more is there?” he asked, continuing to shift with discomfort around her. He couldn’t decide if he wanted to flee his room or press his face into her neck.

“Will you help me wash my hair before dinner?” she asked, the question barely above a whisper. “I’m too tired.” 

He froze, and the heart beat he thought he’d finally gotten under control thudded louder in his ears. ‘Wash her hair?’ A fuzziness overtook the tightness of his chest, expanding and overwhelming him with the sensation. That was almost the same as petting her head. No, worse. He’d have to run his fingers through her hair. Gently. Slowly! That was something lovers did. His head fell backwards as the fuzziness turned to tingling in his extremities. Lightheadedness made him gasp for air but he couldn’t move or speak as his eyes fluttered shut.

“Levi?”

She sighed. ‘He might have actually fainted,’ she thought. 

Really, she should return to her own room and dry off, but she was tired; it felt like all of the energy had drained out of her and Leviathan felt so warm and safe. She’d just rest here until he woke.


	13. The Things I Do For Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leviathan is trapped and he awaits the cavalry to save him.  
> Beelzebub doesn't even know his supper is in peril.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A special thank you to suns_out_sleeps_in_ramblings.  
> I have borrowed the name she chose for Satan in their fiction found here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22458208  
> I apologize for not asking in advance and hope you will forgive me <3
> 
> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

**3|\/|3293|V(7 Chat (2):**

**L3VI:** Lucifer, I have a problem

**Lucifer:** Oh? I don’t usually hear from you about problems.

**Lucifer:** Is this another contest you need me to enter on your behalf?

**L3VI:** No, I have a human problem.

**Lucifer:** Elaborate.

**L3VI:** This one is cute, but she might be defective.

**Lucifer:** I said elaborate. As in elaborate on the problem at hand.

**L3VI:** *Frustrated Demoji*

**L3VI:** She cried until she fell asleep on me.

**L3VI:** I’m afraid to move.

**Lucifer:** What did you do?

**L3VI:** Nothing! I swear!

**Lucifer:** Nothing?

**L3VI:** I may have hugged her.

**L3VI:** ...

**L3VI:** Twice

**Lucifer:** *Facepalm Demoji*

**Lucifer:** Did you touch any of the no touch zones from in your non-perverted video games?

**L3VI:** NO!

**L3VI:** You know I’m saving myself for Ruri-chan’s new virtual reality iteration.

**L3VI:** *Angry Demoji*

**Lucifer:** I’m not even sure what to do with you sometimes.

**L3VI:** Luci, what do I do!? She’s been asleep on me for over twenty-minutes!

**L3VI:** and that’s only counting AFTER I passed out.

**Lucifer:** You know what, this once I’m not even going to ask.

**Lucifer:** What is the outcome you’re looking for?

**L3VI:** She apparates in to her own bathroom’s tub, obviously!

**Lucifer:** I’m trying to understand you. I really am.

**Lucifer:** Also, WHY is she in your bed?

**L3VI:** Look, I don’t have time for this if you aren’t going to help.

**L3VI:** I am on cooking duty and I don’t want to wash her hair.

**Lucifer:**

**Lucifer:** What does that have to do with anything?

**L3VI:** She asked me for help with it because she was too tired.

**Lucifer:** I see.

**Lucifer:** *Facepalm Demoji*

**Lucifer:** I’ll be right over.

**L3VI:** One other problem.

**Lucifer:** What else could you have possibly done in the hour and a half since I last saw you?

**L3VI:** My door is locked

***Player Three has been added to chat***

**Lucifer:** Satan, we have a problem. I don’t have much time to explain, but it is rather time sensitive.

**Not Today, Satan** : …

**Lucifer:** It’s a human problem.

**L3VI:** Please?!

**Not Today, Satan:** What do you need?

**Lucifer:** Can you get Leviathan’s door unlocked without breaking it down or drawing attention to it?

**Not Today, Satan:** Yes.

**Lucifer** : …

**L3VI:** Would you please?

**Not Today, Satan:** The things I do for this family.

**Not Today, Satan:** I’ll be over in a minute.

**Not Today, Satan:** A Little D was already trying to drag me up there anyway.

**L3VI:** Praise be to Ruri-chan. I’ll be free!

**Lucifer** : …

**Not Today, Satan:** ...

* * *

Leviathan sighed. “It’s lucky you’re so cute,” he said and returned to petting her head slowly.


	14. Bro Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They might be in competition, but that doesn't mean they aren't still brothers.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

The umbrellas were a little more sparse than before, but the picture frames were no longer askew. All of the furniture had been returned to their rightful places. The bedroom had been put to rights. The only thing still out of sorts were the room’s inhabitants.

“I didn’t expect you back so soon,” Beelzebub said, toweling off his hair.

“Shift ended early. I wasn’t going to loiter when I could practically feel you getting off,” Belphegor said, with only a little vitriol behind it.

Beelzebub didn’t say anything and turned away to finish getting dressed.

“So?” Belphegor asked, pressing for information as he settled onto his own bed.

“So, what?”

“What had you so fired up?”

Shirt finally pulled down, Beelzebub turned to face his twin and sat on the opposite bed, considering him.

They continued staring, waiting to see who would be the first to say something more.

Beelzebub was the first to look away. “New work-out outfit,” he said, trying not to blush.

“Eeeh? I’m sorry I missed that.” He had shown his interest by asking, but his tone was still bored.

“I broke all of the gym machinery,” Beelzebub said, ducking his head sheepishly to rub at the back of his neck.

Propping himself up on his elbow, Belphegor gave his brother his full attention. He  _ tsk  _ ’d and practically sang, “Lucifer is going to punish you!”

“Worth it,” Beelzebub said, and let himself fall backwards on the mattress.

“So, what about this outfit had you breaking machinery?”

“Layered dragonfly wing pants. Clung to everything,” he said, swallowing hard at the memory. “I don’t think she can see in those levels of infrared though, so, the pattern…Asmo chose painfully well.”

“Go on,” Belphegor asked, encouraging as he watched Beelzebub struggle. It was both infuriating and nice to feel the echo of Beelzebub’s emotional memory welling up in his own body. It helped to paint the picture much more clearly.

“And some sort of ampinga skin sports top, flexed everywhere…” he said, his voice far away and dreamy, “and the—the speckles kept shiftin’ the warmer she got.” He covered his face in his hands and blew out the last of the air in his lungs harshly.

“Hmm. Sounds nice.”

Beelzebub took his hands away from his face, moving to lay properly on the bed to look up at their ceiling. He could still feel Belphegor’s eyes following him. “Quit staring.”

“Quit holding out then.”

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“Really, you broke all of the machines downstairs for some flashy clothing.”

Beelzebub raised his hand, pointing a finger upward, “Very form fitting, flashy clothing!”

“And?”

“And they may have had suggestions written across them…” he murmured.

“Oh-ho!” Belphegor gave one of his rare smiles, but Beelzebub couldn’t see it as he’d thrown his arm across his face to help cool his burning cheeks. “But, surely that wasn’t enough,” Belphegor continued, attempting to drag out as much information as he could. “There was definitely a strong plateau for a while but then  _ seeeveral _ jumps. Sooo?”

“All the machines were broken so she needed a spotter for free weights,” Beelzebub said, rushing the words out.

“Beel, you sneaky fiend. I’m so proud of you,” he said and his voice was warm and full of surety, “ _ but I won’t lose. _ ”

“I kissed her before she left.” Beelzebub didn’t hear any movement from his twin, but he could feel the undercurrent of annoyance.

“Whatever. She likely pulled away to leave.”

There was silence in the room, neither saying anything as Belphegor fumed and tried to ignore the absolute glee being sent his direction.

Eventually, he sat up and sighed drearily before stalking to the door. “Welcome to the table then, brother.”

* * *

Belphegor stepped out into the hall and shut the door quietly behind him. ‘Well speak of the devil,’ he thought, trying to tamp down his sourness as he watched their human approach. ‘A lady clad in a fluffy towel and practically nothing else.’


	15. Wonders Never Cease

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wonders never cease: Satan and Lucifer work together, Leviathan is a champ, Beelzebub is nearly mutinous, and Lucifer tries to kindly help.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

“Hurry up!” Leviathan whispered, motioning frantically while trying not to be too loud for the human lying against him. She wouldn’t wake, but the louder he was the more she frowned and attempted to snuggle into him.

Satan and Lucifer silently looked down at him in the tub.

“Well?” Leviathan asked, exasperated by their calm.

A heavy sigh left Lucifer and he rubbed at his face. “Are you able to lift her while you stand?” he asked, pitching his voice into a deep rumble, making no effort to reduce the volume of his speech.

“Keep your voice down!” Levi hissed, covering her exposed ear with his hand and pressing the other more firmly against his chest. “Every time I try to wake her she moves! And I’m going to die if she keeps doing it!”

Clutching his stomach, Satan leaned down to rest his hand on his bent knees, a silent laugh wracking him. 

“It’s not funny!” Leviathan froze as the human began to stir. Maybe she was finally waking up? She was moving more than before. Loosening his tail from around her middle, he held his breath, his eyes wide. It seemed like she was almost awake. He shot a fearful expression to his brothers. Would it be weird to put out his hand for them to hold? Or maybe to pull him out? 

‘NO! No! No. No.’ She wasn’t waking up, she was just turning around to sloth herself across him. His arms now between them to make some space he tried to shield himself but it only put his hands in contact with her collarbones, his forearms resting against her bathing suit and the impossibly soft flesh under it.

“Help me,” Leviathan squeaked out. There was nowhere safe to touch with her facing toward him, but he didn’t want to try to escape in case he accidentally harmed her in his panic.

A hiccoughing cough bought Leviathan’s attention for a split second; Satan was finally getting himself under control and was pulling himself upright. Lucifer’s peevish glare had only prolonged his amusement. “No, as much as I hate to admit it, this time he’s right,” Satan said, his voice also thrummed low, “human females don’t usually respond to many sounds in this range, but your squeaking might wake her.”

‘Ugh, that smug look on his stupid face,’ Leviathan thought. If it wouldn’t make her cling more desperately, he’d send Satan head first into the nearest tank. Instead, he quelled even the urge to throw the towel at Satan, and slowly began to tilt her upright, leaning forward into her to do so. It was days like these he was very happy to have a tail.

Stopping only to get his breathing back under control, Leviathan carefully extricated both of them from the tub. But she was still stuck to him like a limpet. “What do I do?” he whined, trying to keep from twitching every time he felt her exhale against him. “Not sure my body can handle any more physical contact.”

Lucifer reached forward and unwrapped one of her arms from around Leviathan’s neck, and continued coaxing her limbs away as if he were rearranging a wayward vine on a trellis.

She whined at the loss of warmth as she was slowly peeled away, but the three breathed a sigh of relief as she was now upright and her fists were rubbing at her eyes. It was short lived. With a tiny grumble of her own, she pitched forward and wrapped her arms around the upper portion of Leviathan’s tail. Her legs didn’t bother balancing her any longer as she leaned in to him leeching more of his warmth.

Mouth wide with uncertainty, carefully Leviathan lowered her and himself to the floor, mindful not to drop her and bruise her knees that now straddled his tail. He could feel a tremor starting in his torso; soon it would spread to his limbs and he wouldn’t be able to think anymore. ‘Only a little longer,’ he told himself. Help was here, he just had to hold on a little longer and keep that hysterical feeling at bay. He couldn’t afford to whip his tail to and fro to fling her off. His Henry was weak and wouldn’t survive sudden movements.

“That can’t be healthy,” Satan said, gesturing to Leviathan’s face. “We really shouldn’t be able to see that much red in this blue lighting.” He tapped his foot and brought his hand to his chin, quietly thinking while he stared down at the problem. After a few moments had passed, Satan pressed his hand to her shoulder, purposefully moving between her and Lucifer who had been about to reach for her. “Cold. Humans’ body heat dips when they sleep.” 

Leviathan was shaking, but he realized it wasn't the usual twitchy shiver that was uncontrolled; it was Satan gripping his shoulder, rocking his body to bring the world back into focus for him. It shouldn’t have surprised him, Satan had been known to disarm him in the past, only today he felt like a bomb with frayed wires. 

“Let’s get her to the bathroom and spray her down with warm water.” Satan said, “If it works, she lets go and you can escape. If she wakes, well she lets go and is warm.”

Lucifer nodded along with the plan. “Let's go and get this over with. I’d like to remove her before calling for the physician.” Leviathan could see the determination in his serious expression. It was one thing to be teased about his hikikomori tendencies, or for Lucifer to ask for translations of his speech, but Lucifer knew it was another thing entirely to leave him in this level of distress in his own lair. 

The moment she woke he was going to flee. 

* * *

With a helping hand, Satan hauled Leviathan upright as Lucifer lifted the woman attached like a boa constrictor to his tail.

‘What a comical sight,’ Lucifer thought, trying to breathe through the farcical endeavor.

He was doing this for his family.

He was doing this to try to avoid embarrassing the human.

He was doing this because Diavolo would be displeased if the human wanted to return home…He sighed.

He was glad he had left his overcoat in the study.

The shower started and Satan sprayed down the blue tile wall, heating it before Lucifer could try to lean her against it. A squawk of discomfort left Leviathan as his tail was squeezed tighter in Lucifer’s attempt to shift her into a more vertical position. He growled a reprimand to them both. 

‘Such a strange human.’ Certainly, lower frequencies would be less likely to wake her, but all animals still felt the prickle of vibration even if they couldn’t hear or understand it. Her seeming contentedness in the presence of Infernal speech was flummoxing to say the least. Other than a huff and nuzzling at Leviathan’s poor abused tail, as her world once again tilted, she didn’t seem disturbed in the slightest and fell back into unconsciousness.

With a steady hand to guide her into leaning her shoulder against the wall, Lucifer situated her so that she faced Leviathan. His tail looked as though it were still at an uncomfortable angle but it would have to do for now. ‘How could she have run herself so ragged that she dropped like this? Didn’t she consider how difficult this would be for Leviathan?’ Lucifer stopped his internal rant before it could gain speed. If anything, he should have been more attentive to her health. To have her collapse like this was a stain on his honour, worse, it was a blemish on Diavolo’s exchange project.

Lucifer looked down at Leviathan, who, for once, was unable to take his eyes off the human whose gaze he could rarely meet. His worry was clear, enough so that he’d allowed Satan and himself to see her vulnerable  _ and  _ reveal the depths of his own weakness in the process. Even now, Lucifer couldn’t detect a trace of envy from his second lieutenant. His fear was evident, but Lucifer suspected it had less to do with her proximity and more to do with the limbo his mistress was in.

At first she tried to shift away from the warmth of shower as it was turned on her, but quickly she relaxed into it.

“She’s just like Henry 1.0,” Leviathan whispered, awed as she loosened her grip and basked in the warmth.

Satan flicked the water to her face and she sputtered. Always the agent of discerning chaos.

Leviathan froze as she raised her hand from around his tail to wipe the water from her face.

This was it. This was his chance to run. She’d released him. But Leviathan didn’t budge from his spot next to her. She looked so confused and lost. Then she looked at Leviathan, and Lucifer saw how the tension of his shoulders dropped. Did he know he’d reached out to hold her hand?

“Morning, Levia-chan,” she said dreamily, her eyes still trying to blink into focus.

“M-Morning,” Leviathan stuttered out, his voice high. His following gulp was audible.

Lucifer tried not to roll his eyes at the scene before him. He settled to looking over to Satan, who had suddenly become intensely interested by the couple’s interactions. It reminded him of the way the long-eared onza beasts from Terra Firma would fixate before pouncing.

She yawned without covering her mouth and without another word disappeared back into herself, her hand falling from Leviathan’s down to land against his tail.

All three of them looked at one another.

“I will send for the doctor once we’ve returned her to her room,” said Lucifer, kneeling to look more closely at her. Barbatos would be able to recommend one, or a reliable witch. This fledgling already had one at her disposal for other sundry things, perhaps it would be best to call on her.

Unfurling his tail from her, Leviathan tried to suppress how he shook, but it was clear her hand and the wet flesh of her waist against his scales were playing havoc with the last of his nerves. He crawled a ways away before standing and running out the door of his bedroom in the direction of the pool. 

Satan continued to hold the shower head over the human, and frowned at the back-splash collecting against his pants. “I’ll turn this off and you take her to her room?” he asked.

“I assumed you would want to carry your mistress?” Lucifer answered readily.

“Oh, no. If Mammon catches me carrying her none of us will sleep for the foreseeable future. Besides,  _ you’re  _ already wet,” he said, motioning at the damp spot across Lucifer’s vest.

He pursed his lips. “I don't want to wash her hair,” he muttered.

“What?”

He didn’t deign to answer that question. “Very well,” he said, trying not to show his annoyance, it would only encourage him. 

Collecting a towel from the rack, Lucifer bundled her up as best he could to avoid getting any more wet than he already was, but it was a lost cause. Her soaked hair wicked water up to his collar as her head lolled against him, and the water from the bend of her legs slid down his arm to soak the rolled up sleeves at his elbows.

For once, in accord, Lucifer and Satan headed out together. They knew their roles without speaking. Satan would ensure a diversion for anyone heading near the kitchen and her room, and he would get his little headache back to her own bed.

It wasn’t far to her room, certainly there were a number of unused rooms in the hall between here and there, but this would be no mean feat. Lucifer stepped out and Satan closed the door behind them as they broke apart.

Walking swiftly with her in his arms, Lucifer didn’t run, and didn’t speed them there; running would only draw attention to anyone passing by, or anyone within hearing distance. He needed to keep quiet so that he could focus on Satan’s voice if they were to remain unseen.

‘Maybe she is a curse,’ he considered when halfway to their destination, Beelzebub stepped out of his room. Lucifer could see the alarm beginning to rise in him as his eyes swept over the woman in his arms. This was going to be loud if it wasn’t dealt with properly.

Lucifer shifted her weight to fall on his breast bone, and held up his free hand to put a finger to his lips.

“What’s happened?” Beelzebub asked. He didn’t seem able to form any other words as he shifted weight from foot to foot and stared uneasily.

“She fell asleep after swimming and Levi couldn’t wake her,” Lucifer said, whispering back in a low tone.

“Let me carry her for you.”

“Don’t be stupid, then both of us will be soaked.”

“You’ll need help getting through the door.”

Lucifer shifted her again to raise his hand once more. “We don’t have time for this. Come along if you must.”

To his frustration, Beelzebub didn’t move out of the way. In fact, he stepped back into their path.

“I do not enjoy this insubordination,” Lucifer said through gritted teeth, trying not to grind them audibly.

“You haven’t given an order, and a good anvil doesn’t fear the hammer,” Beelzebub said, his scowl growing deeper by the second.

“We’ll talk about this later,” Lucifer said as he carefully handed her over. It would be easier if Beelzebub were their shield, but this would work too. If anyone walked past, he could easily block their view of her, doubly so if Beelzebub pivoted even slightly towards the wall.

He marched them to her room where the door opened easily. Motioning for Beelzebub to take her to the bathroom, Lucifer turned around, scanning the hall, mindful of any prying eyes, before shutting the door behind them.

Following closely, Lucifer ducked into the bathroom after them. “Set her in the tub and turn on the tap before she gets cold,” he said, and this time it was an order. There was no question that followed as he left to find something warm for her to wear, only the sound of the tap on full.

‘Of course Asmodeus would organize the bed clothes in the lowest, hardest to use drawer,’ he half-mused and half-griped while he retrieved what must be the realm’s second fluffiest and most pink pajamas. He would have to see about having the drawer edges rubbed with surfactant. There was no reason for it to be catching like that.

When he returned, he found her already half submerged while Beelzebub watched her intently, kneeling at her side as he stroked a finger across her cheek.

“She’ll be fine,” Lucifer reassured him. “She’s just tired out.”

Beelzebub looked up at him, his eyes saying they wanted to believe him, but he kept eye contact as he pressed an orange nail into her shoulder until it broke skin.

She squirmed away with a hearty little growl and hiss, but didn’t fully wake, and Beelzebub caught her with his other hand before she slid too far into the water.

‘What am I supposed to say now?' He’d lied to Beelzebub about Lilith and Belphegor, and he seemed so very attached to the troublesome human. He couldn’t imagine he would be able to hold Beelzebub’s loyalty forever if he continued lying to him like this. “I don’t know what’s wrong yet, but she did wake, and when she did she recognized Leviathan without issues,” he said, straightening his posture, and tugging his waist coat down. “I’ll be sending for a doctor once she’s decent. Until then, you need to go down to the common room before the others start asking questions.”

“Why shouldn’t they know?” Beelzebub asked. 

Lucifer watched him bite back something else, a quickly rising combativeness that couldn’t be allowed to flourish. “Do you trust me to do what’s best?”

Beelzebub paused before he answered. “I do.”

“Then keep them calm. The last thing she needs is the five of them trying to mother hen her and smothering her to death in the process.”

The tension in Beelzebub’s shoulders loosened and he tenderly repositioned his Mistress so that her arms were over one side of the tub before he stood to move towards the exit.

“Beel,” Lucifer said a little louder.

He stopped without turning.

“You can come check on her after dinner.”

He nodded without turning back and left. It was unlikely he’d eat much, which meant Lucifer had little time before his brothers-in-arms began asking questions.

Lucifer’s irritation was clear in the way he forcefully unbuttoned and tossed off his vest. “Now to you and your damn hair.”

She seemed to come to as he lathered the soap in her hair, and his patience was rewarded with actual words.

“Why do I smell fruit?...And why is my head tingly?” she asked, slowly looking around to take in her own bathroom.

“Because your shampoo says ‘Citrus Verbena - Mint Fresh,’” he said, his deep voice echoing loudly in the silent room. He felt her stiffen, but he continued to lather, and slowly her shoulders relaxed away from her ears.

He held her in place when she tried to turn her head, not that she had put much effort into it. ‘More of a test,’ he thought. ‘Always testing me.’

“This is weird,” she said, her voice even, but still filled with confusion.

“Yes, but now it is time to rinse,” he said, bringing up the miniature shower nozzle. “Shield your eyes if you can.” He was pleased to see she could. ‘But does she even notice the soap running into the little half moon cut in her shoulder?’ he wondered, his lips pursing worriedly.

“Lean back,” he said, and she did so with trepidation. ‘At least she’s listening,’ he thought. ‘Small miracles.’

“What are you doing?”

“Applying conditioner. This one appears to be mintier; be forewarned.”

He felt her attempt to turn around again, but he steered her head forward. “Stay still,” he said, and he somehow managed to make it sound like a request. She always did poorly with orders.

Noting that she relaxed ever so slightly when he combed the conditioner through her hair with his fingers, he moved slower. ‘Calm and docile would be ideal right now,’ he thought. The bottle said five to ten minutes but that seemed excessive. Three was enough and likely all his patience could manage.

“I meant, why are you doing it?” she asked after a few moments.

He hummed in thought while he let the conditioner set, his hands still moving, massaging her scalp, and hopefully befuddling her into silence. “Leviathan called me when you fell asleep and he couldn’t wake you.”

“But why are you washing my hair? In. My. Bathroom?” she asked slowly, as if he were the one with fog for brains.

“You requested he do this before you fell asleep, presumably to remove the salt water, and he has cooking duty,” he said matter-of-factly. ‘End of discussion, young lady!’

She just shook her head. “Wasn’t today my day to cook dinner? Nothing ever makes sense here.”

“Well, if you’re not too tired now, I can leave you to finish rinsing.”

* * *

Her shoulders slumped obviously. She was very tired, but she could probably lift her arms. ‘But where would be the fun in that?’ she thought. She bowed her head meekly. “No, thank you,” she said, her tone contrite, but inwardly she tried to hold back her exhilaration. A small smile sneaked out, but she was certain he couldn’t see it from behind her.

Definitely a day of firsts.

Here she was, sleepy, with Lucifer on his knees, serving her needs. The only demon in the house she didn't have a pact with, and possibly the most arrogant of them all.

Staying still, she enjoyed the feeling of his hands in her hair, and tried not to pout when he announced that she was done.

He took his revenge when he hosed her down after the tub had drained. “To get the last of the soap film” he claimed, but she knew better. At least it was a mild revenge.

Watchfully, he helped her steady her as she stepped out of the tub and sat on the edge, her toes flexing and unflexing on top of what had to be one of Leviathan’s towels. ‘Tie dye blues,’ she thought. ‘Clearly Levi’s.’ Her damp bath mat was still hanging up from earlier.

As he approached her with one of her own towels, she eyed Lucifer warily.

He mopped at her with it.

“Stop that,” she said, giving his hand a small slap when he reached for one of the thick bathing suit straps.

Eyeing her like he would a spooked horse he pulled back for a moment. “You were unconscious not long ago. It would be very helpful if you would stop hindering my aid.”

When he pressed near again, she wiggled out of his reach, and almost ended up back in the bathtub.

Limp across his arm, he hoisted her up from the edge. The dip had taken some of the vinegar out of her. “I am not trying to molest you,” he said, as if that should be the most obvious thing in the world. “I  _ would _ , however, like for you to be dry and dressed by the time Beelzebub returns to check on you.”

She was stunned by the drop. Her mind was foggy and her hands reached toward him just as he pulled her close. Now against him, she could tell that his black collared shirt was soaked through. Glancing at her counter she saw his discarded waistcoat and gloves. He couldn’t have gotten that wet just from washing her hair, could he? 

Before she could spook and attempt to flee again, he whipped the towel around her form, creating a sheet sling. Maneuvering it under her arms, he held both points together and would be able to pivot her anywhere he so chose to do so.

She frowned at him and prepared to escape. 

“Always so vexatious!” Sliding his leg behind her, he let the backs of her legs hit his knee. Off balance she fell, but the sling caught her.

She felt a sickening drop in her stomach, but found herself, instead of on the floor, sitting on Lucifer's bent knee. It was suddenly very warm on her perch as she looked him over. “Well, wonders never cease,” she said, but her eyes couldn’t quite focus on him as well as she would have liked. He was much more handsome up close than she’d remembered. “Never thought I’d see the day Lucifer knelt.”

Letting go of the towel, he let her fall backwards. He nabbed the sheet again at the last second and she was stuck, back bent over his knee. “What was that?”

“Nothing…” she said, humbling herself quickly. He wouldn’t have missed the tight, sad whine to the word. He smelled weakness the way sharks sensed blood, and she could draw mercy out of him with it on occasion.

“That’s what I thought,” he said, and pulled her upright. “Now, if you have enough energy to fight me like this, you have enough energy to towel yourself off.”

This time he carefully lowered her off his knee and to the floor. “Your pajamas are on the counter top,” he said as he passed her a second towel. “Do not keep me waiting.”

With that he made his grand exit and closed the bathroom door behind him.

What on Earth had she missed? The last thing she remembered was crying and Leviathan passing out from too much contact.

She felt at her puffy eyes with her hands. They weren’t nearly as swollen as before. ‘How long was I asleep?” she wondered. Hopefully Leviathan and Henry were all right. Lucifer likely wouldn’t tell her if I asked either. He was treating her like some sort of invalid. ‘At least he doesn't seem angry with me.’

After tousling her hair, she carefully peeled away the pink bathing suit. Standing slowly, she finished toweling off, and could see the contrast of the love bites against the white of her towel. ‘Oh they’ve really purpled,’ she thought, but not quite able to bring herself to be angry with Asmodeus. Hopefully, they would heal quickly!

Tugging on the thick pajamas, she was pleased to find that they buttoned quite high. It was thoughtful of Lucifer to pick something modest when she felt so uncertain and wobbly. ‘He really does try to do right by those in his household,’ she thought, measuring his actions against his words. ‘It’s a shame he’s just so high handed in his methods.’


	16. Exhaustion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucifer and MC come to an understanding.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Fairly sure of her ability to keep her feet under her, she opened the bathroom door and walked to her bed. She squeaked loudly with fright when Lucifer’s hands captured the sides of her ribcage and lifted her up to stand her on the mattress. Where did he come from? She hadn’t seen him anywhere!

“I’m pleased to see that you’ve managed to dress yourself and move under your own power,” he said. Releasing her, his gloved hands continued to hover at her sides while she turned to face him.

“You don’t look pleased,” she said, trying not to scowl at him for startling her. She hadn’t realized just how close he was again. Was he trying to make her blush? The warmth of his hands continued to linger even after he’d withdrawn from her completely.

“You walked past me completely unaware,” he said, raising an eyebrow. “Your obliviousness, following a lengthy unconsciousness, is a matter of concern.” He took a half step back to study her, watching as she balanced without him for support. “Hands out.” 

She put her hands out without complaint, and watched his frown deepen. Was he really complaining that she’d obeyed him for once without putting up a fuss?

Turning over her hands, and squeezing at all of the little bones, he didn’t seem to find anything based on what his impassive expression conveyed. Her hands were guided back to her sides before Lucifer pressed at her forearms. It was a strange mini-massage as he pressed along the lines of her body, skirting down her limbs and putting pressure on her joints. His touch never lingered or tread anywhere inappropriate; it was clinical.

“Any pain here?” he asked, pressing down against her shoulders. “Do they feel the same on either side?”

“No?” she asked. It was a struggle not to be obvious about her enjoyment of the attention. Lucifer was not the most touchy-feely of her house-mates to say the least, and this was likely a once in a millennia occurrence. More importantly, there didn’t seem to be any expectations attached to the comforting gesture. It would be relaxing if it weren’t for her treacherous body trying to tell her to lean in to every touch. “They feel the same.”

He frowned again, but it was gone quickly, displaced by concentration as he raised his hands to put pressure on either side of her jaw. The leather of his gloves was an unexpected contrast to the fluffiness of her pajamas that had been pressed against her skin before. She tried not to shiver as he palpated his fingertips over her skull and down her neck. 

What was he looking for? Did he think she’d hit her head? ‘Something must be wrong for him to be this thorough,’ she thought, a knot beginning to grow in her stomach. Lucifer was not the kind of demon to seek out physical contact, at least not from her. 

“You have me stumped,” he said, using his thumb on her cheekbone to gently pull at her lower lid and look at the whites of her eyes. “I cannot find a plausible reason for you having collapsed earlier. I will need to call a doctor.”

“I’m fine, Lucifer,” she said. The last thing she wanted was another physical. The semi-annual medical check-up had tested everything from the thickness of her skin to her running endurance. She was done with demonic doctors. 

“ _ I _ will decide if you are fine.”

She fisted her hands and put them on her hips. “And  _ I’m _ getting real tired of my lack of self-determination around here!”

* * *

He looked at her, his mouth set in a hard line as he waited. His expression grew more serious the longer she continued to meet his eyes. “Are you being contrary on purpose or because you’re tired?” he asked gently, debating whether she realized she’d just stomped her foot like an angry child.

“I’m being contrary because everything happens around me or to me,” she said, her eyes beginning to water. Abruptly, she looked away and sat down on the bed. “Never mind, I’m just tired.”

Her expression was cryptic as he helped her under the covers, something between hurt and confused. Evidently, fluffing pillows was not something she had ever envisioned him doing.

“Are you sure you’re just tired?” he asked again.

She patted the bed next to her.

“I am not a pet,” he said.

“If you want me to share my problem, then you’re just going to have to share a seat,” she replied.

“I am not going to get on your bed while my clothes are still saturated,” he said gesturing down his body.

“Suit yourself,” she said and began to roll over to sleep.

‘This infuriating little human! She had best thank her lucky stars that she’s a child of Lilith or so help me…’ He kicked off his wet shoes, socks and shirt, letting them fall to the carpet, next to the broken side rails of her bed. That would need to be addressed later. He had no doubt that one of his brothers had broken the siding, the real question was did they do with the evidence?

He climbed onto the bed to sit parallel to her. At least his pants weren’t too damp. The things he did for family and loyalty…

She turned back over, somehow startled at the dip of the mattress, as if she hadn’t just invited him into her bed. “I didn’t say get naked!”

“I am not repeating myself.”

“Fine.” She covered her eyes with her hands.

It felt like minutes ticked by before she finally dropped her hands away. “I promise I’m just tired. It happens to humans sometimes when they’re under too much stress. We just stop, kind of the same way machines seize up, and have to take some time to reset.”

“That seems highly unusual, a whole species wouldn’—”

She pressed his lecturing arm down with both of her hands. “Have you seen me cry since I arrived?”

Looking up and away, he attempted to recall a time her eyes had done more than water at wind or magic. The only time he could think of was when Mammon let her use a whole Hell Sauce spice packet.

“Have you seen me slacking in any of my duties or tasks?”

She’d never actually fallen behind despite the shenanigans into which she was regularly recruited. He racked his mind for her most recent test results.

“What about sleep?”

“I suppose—”

“I rarely sleep well because I usually have noisy company. I still have trouble eating the right foods here, and no matter what, I try to be cheerful and get along,” she said, squeezing his arm for emphasis as her words began to tumble out. “No matter how many times I’m told that I’ll be torn limb from limb, or how many times I’m kidnapped, or I actually die for a few moments, or think I’m about to be devoured...”

Not that it would truly mark his skin in any way, but he looked down in concern as her thumbs began to worry across the portions of his arm she had squeezed. He was silent as he watched her calm herself, noting that she wasn’t anywhere near the verge of tears. 

“I just held it in for too long and the reboot was a bit rough,” she finished lamely.

“Very well. What do you require for your human-reset?” he asked. Sleep would certainly be a factor. He knew well enough from Belphegor’s meddling how easily a change in sleep could unbalance a human.

She thought carefully before she answered. “Quiet, sleep, and comfort. Maybe no tasks for a couple days?”

Nodding his understanding, he removed her hands from his person, placing them in her lap. Those would not be difficult to acquire or maintain; he was perturbed, however, by her temperature. ‘Humans exist in such a small range of temperature,’ he thought. Her damp hair should cool her, and her embarrassment was enough for the flushed cheeks, but her hands were much too warm. His gloves already on the floor with his shoes, he felt her forehead with the back of his hand. “You’re burning up.”

“It’s fine,” she said. It was her turn to pull his hand away and pat at it. “That can happen with exhaustion too. Just rest and fluids.” She gave him a small smile. “I’ll be back up and running in no time.”

“I will see to it,” he said, and rose to collect his things. At least this time he could use his intrinsic speed to go to his own rooms without issue.

“Lucifer?”

He looked back to her, his wet clothing and shoes in hand.

“Is there a way to lock my door from the outside?” she asked.

“I’ll see to it as well.”

“Thank you,” she said, and snuggled down into her pillows, falling back asleep before he’d even closed the door behind him. 

To think that one human could cause so much chaos, and inflict so much change, within half a year. She looked docile and manageable now, but he both feared and relished the challenge of the next six months ahead.


	17. Not a Cultural Misunderstanding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beelzebub checks on MC as promised.
> 
> Mammon arrives with soup.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Beelzebub excused himself from the table early again, knowing it would worry the others, but at least it would redirect Asmodeus’ teasing of Leviathan while they were busy trying to figure out his stomach. Throughout dinner Belphie had been eyeing him suspiciously. They would have to talk later; first he wanted to go check on her.

Key in hand, he was under instruction from Lucifer to deliver it to their human. He had been told that she needed quiet, but it seemed very little else was at play beyond exhaustion. ‘Quiet will be difficult to get,’ he thought, locking the door behind him as he entered her room. ‘ _ Mammon  _ will be difficult. He’s already asking where she is.’

The glow lanterns were still partially illuminated in her room. They gave her a healthy glow. It reassured him. ‘She seems well enough,’ he thought, pulling up a chair from the table set, to sit next to her. 

He reached out and held her hand, much the same as when they’d shared a room. It had always helped him feel better. She didn’t seem sick, but Lucifer was right, she was warm. Tentatively, he reached toward her forehead, only to find his wrist caught in mid-air instead. Her eyes were still blinking into focus and he didn’t move.

“Why is everyone touching my head today?” she asked, her tone fussy.

“Sorry,” he said. “Just came to check up on you.”

“It’s okay. I’m just tired,” she said as her stomach growled.

It was impossible for him not to smile at that. “Mammon should be bringing you a plate soon.” Slowly, he brought their hands down, since she seemed to have forgotten they existed. “Lucifer will suggest it,” he said, smiling knowingly when she quirked an eyebrow at Mammon’s name. “Do I get my hand back or are you going to keep it?”

She let go of his wrist, and he regretted saying anything. He liked the way her hand couldn't close around it completely. “Do you mind if I stay to keep you company?”

“I’ll be pretty boring company. I’m just sleeping.”

“Have you met my favourite person in the world?” he asked, with a laugh. He knew he’d gotten his way when she smiled sleepily and patted the empty spot on the bed. “Maybe after Mammon has come and gone,” he said, but her sad eyes broke him down quickly. “Just for a few minutes then.”

Sliding his parka off, he put it on the same hooked branch he’d found it on the night before, blushing when he remembered the treasure it had held in its pocket.

She held up the covers for him, but he pushed them back down, and climbed on top instead. “I’m warm enough already,” he said, as he lay his head on the pillow next to hers. 

Fighting down his blush, he took her hand in his again. “Lucifer said you need quiet, sleep, and comfort,” he said. “The first two are straightforward. What do humans need for comfort?”

“Comfort is tough to define…” she said, wiggling her fingers in his hand, drumming them in thought. “For some humans it’s a particular type of soup, their favourite television series, a pet to keep them company and cuddle with.” She trailed off, blinking at him as if she were drifting away into sleep again.

* * *

Beelzebub squeezed her hand, refocusing her. “But what do _ you  _ need for comfort?” he asked, massaging her small hand in his. 

She bit her lip, thinking of their kiss earlier. “U-Um, well, I have everything I need. Already very cozy,” she said, keeping the worst of her flustered feelings out of her answer. Why were all of them so painfully beautiful. He was so close she could easily slide her hand out of his and into his hair.

“Tell me the  _ truth  _ ,” Beelzebub said, cupping her cheek to draw her averted gaze back to him. She was always terrible at lying when she was with him. 

Being this close to temptation was the real torture of the Devildom. She’d already melted for him once today. How did he expect her to withstand more sweetness? But caught in her omission, it almost felt more wrong not to tell him now. He was always so sincere. It wouldn't hurt to tell him, right?

“I-I like to be held,” she said, still trying to look away, even as his hand pulled her closer to his chest..

“Then why are you all the way over there?” he asked, and she swore his voice had grown coarser, deeper. It wasn’t just the heat of her fever, her toes curled at the sound.

He pulled her to him, until she was resting partially draped across his chest. “It sounds as though Diavolo will be setting a ‘spring break’ in motion as of the 44th. I suspect we have you to thank for that,” he said, drawing her hand up so that he could kiss it.

She was going to choke on her own heartbeat any minute. Why did he have to smell so good? Why were there still so many layers between them? ‘I should have just showered with him instead,’ she thought. A soft ‘ _ hmm  _ ’ left her as he spoke, trying to sound as though she was following along and not talking herself out of destroying their friendship by groping him. 

“Lucky for us,” she said, measuring each breath. This was normal, right? Resting her head near his collarbone, she tried to relax. No, this was only normal for Asmodeus; definitely not normal for sweet, gorgeous Beelzebub.

“Diavolo will take any excuse to throw a party. When you’re feeling better, how would you like to practice dancing with me?” he asked, his words purred near her ear, and thrumming into her through his chest. He brought his lips to the inside of her wrist.

‘It’s so warm in here,’ she thought, and tried to sit up. “I-I’d like that very much.”

Instantly, Beelzebub moved to help her, and she had to bite her lip to keep from expressing how good it felt to have his hands on her, lifting her like that. She licked her lips, still uncertain. “Beel, about earlier today—” she said.

“I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable,” he said, sitting himself up, and beginning to draw away.

Her hands were over his, holding them in place at her waist faster than she’d brought down the fork in Hattusa. “I…I don’t know if that was just a thank you,” she said, stumbling over her words, “or maybe something lost in cultural translation, but…could I have another?” She let his hands go, heart in throat.

The answer was very clear. He closed the short distance between them and kissed her. One large hand slowly tracing along her ribs, just shy of her breast while the other tangled in her hair.

His kiss was gentle once again, slowly trying to get to know her, and learn what she liked.

Even if this was only a thank you, a comfort, she wouldn’t miss this opportunity. She ran her hands up and down his chest, trying to detail all of the dips and muscles she knew so well by sight. How many times had she kept her hands to herself while helping him perfect his form? How many times had he “accidentally” spilled water on himself and had to take off his shirt?

She felt so blissfully warm and cold at the same time, like she could breath him in and everything would be all right. The distance between them was still too great for her liking; she drew her hand up the strong column of his neck, and back down to slide over his shoulder before she pulled herself up his body, losing herself in the sensations she’d been denied for far too long.

.

Her kiss was everything Beelzebub had wanted it to be, but when his hand slipped under the edge of her top he stopped himself. Well, he tried to still his hand. He spanned nearly half her waist with it, but she was warmer than him. ‘Is this a normal temperature for humans?’ he wondered, before her tongue distracted him again. She was usually cool when he touched her. He didn’t want to end the kiss, but if she was sick he should be doting on her, not taking from her when she needed the energy to recover.

He began to pull away, but she trailed her lips to his jaw line instead of letting him go, leaving feather light kisses there before she got to his ear. His mouth watered at the way she leaned into him to reach that spot, exposing her throat to him.

“You taste so good, Beel,” she said, catching his earlobe between her teeth, and slowly releasing it to the softness of her lips.

How could he stop when she said things like that? All of his fantasies came flooding back to him, and he swept the hand under her shirt further around her, circling her in his arm and supporting her against him in her new very, very perfect position.

Dipping his head, he kissed her neck. ‘Fuck,’ he thought. The sounds she made when he did that were only making him harder. He did it again, and then again, tasting along her collarbone, biting gently where she made the lowest sounds.

She pressed herself against him in any way she could. “More,” she whispered to him.

The hand she had been using to encourage his mouth to her throat followed the length of his arm. “I want both,” she said, her voice raw with want. Taking his lonely hand, she guided it to her bottom, forcing him to grip her ass.

Halting his efforts along her neck, he looked into her eyes just as she kicked off the last of the blankets, and swung her leg over his lap. 'I should have kissed her months ago,' he thought. He was hard under her, painfully so, and she was making it much, much worse, but also so much better with the heat of her body.

Experimentally, he gripped her ass more tightly, and she rocked against him. Her eyes didn’t leave his except to stare hungrily at his mouth. ‘I have more stamina than this.’ He promised himself he could last through her teasing, but it didn’t matter how many times he’d imagined her fucking herself on him on the inclined bench, or the way he’d thought of helping her with her stretches: he hadn’t trained for this.

Her hands were hot all over him, while her mouth tried to find new places to savour. He was trying so hard to keep his demonic form tucked away as it tried to flicker into existence. He wanted to devour her. It was almost under control until she whispered to him.

“Don’t fight it,” she said, her voice wicked in his ear. “I like your horns.” 

She leaned back to admire them, and he bit back a moan as the new angle ground her closer to him. The heat of her, with only two layers of fabric between them, was becoming too much.

A loud knock came from her doorway, but she didn’t even look at it. She licked her lips and reached for one of the black, glossy horns.

“You have visitors,” he said, his voice hoarse whisper and he held himself stock-still as if that might freeze this moment in time.

“I don’t care,” she said, pressing him back into the winding headboard and the sea of pillows. Shushing him with a finger to her lips, she used her weight and her other hand gripping his horn to recline him further under her.

A rapid thumping shook the door and rattled the hinges. “HEY HUMAN, WAKE UP! I BROUGHT YOU SOME DINNER, SO YA BETTER BE GRATEFUL.”

‘Mammon.’ Beelzebub closed his eyes, and eased her off of him, and back into her previous seat, even as she continued to reach for him. If not for his overall physical strength, he wouldn’t have been able to complete the separation fast enough before his strength of will dissolved.

Beelzebub sprang from the bed and towards the door, only stopping to readjust himself. Erection safely hidden between his belt and belly, Beelzebub threw the door open with more force than he’d intended. “Mammon, what did Lucifer tell you? Quiet, sleep and comfort. What was the first one?” He looked ready to accuse Mammon of food theft. Hopefully, her visitors wouldn’t stay for too long.

Showing good sense, Mammon looked regretful. Belphie did not. Not at all.

“Well, she’s already awake, now,” Mammon said, pointing between Beelzebub and the door frame at the tiny sliver of human he could see. “Might as well feed her now.”

Beelzebub’s own stomach rumbled and he looked back at her. She raised her hand, and he didn’t know if it meant he should wait here with the three of them or go eat. His hunger had disappeared when he thought he was about to devour her instead, but it had come rushing back at full force, reminding him of the scant evening meal he’d had today.

“Better go feed that, bro,” Belphie said with an energy that was unusual for him. He pushed past them both, flicking his finger off of one of Beelzebub’s horns for good measure.

‘I forgot to put them away,’ Beelzebub thought, cringing inwardly. He sent her an apologetic look as Mammon followed after the youngest creation. The kitchen was only a wall away from her, he’d kicked it down once before, but it was still further than he wanted to be from her now.

His mind made up, he walked resolutely to the kitchen. There was still plenty left from dinner, as he had left the table early, but he could still feel her hands on him, and he had trouble deciding from which plate to even start.

‘I forgot to give her the key,’ he thought, shoulders slumping as he stared at the food in front of him.


	18. Nursemaids

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon and Belphegor come to visit the sleepy human after supper.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Belphegor pulled up the empty chair at her bedside and sat down, putting his feet next to her on the bed. “Lucifer says you’re out of commission for the next little while.” Tilting the chair back until it was balancing on its back legs, he missed the sour look she gave him.

At least he was in his socks. None of them ever seemed to take their footwear off inside the house and she couldn’t decide if it was due to having Little Demons constantly following behind them to tidy, or if she had missed a memo about the floor occasionally turning to lava. Once a year the carpet probably came to life and tried to eat their toes and anything nearby that scampered.

“Eh, you’re lookin’ pretty flushed there, human,” Mammon said as he set the tray on her lap. He looked her over as she investigated the food he’d brought.

“Thank you for your thoughtfulness,” she said, “but I’ll be fine.” The soup was still steaming and boiling. It would have to wait.

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t let anybody say I never do nothin’ for ya,” he said. He stuck his hands in his pockets and quickly looked away, scanning her room for new collectibles.

‘Maybe it’s chicken noodle?’ she wondered. ‘Doubtful.’ She poked at it, suspecting the meat from the crisper.

“Hey, uh...since you’re laid up and won’t be able to use it, think I could borrow some cash?” Mammon asked.

She raised a single eyebrow.

“I promise I'll never ask again!"

That was probably in the top ten most ridiculous things he had ever said. Sadly, she knew he really believed it. She picked up her D.D.D. and transferred Grimm into his account. It’d become common enough now that he was a registered recipient on her account, not that it made a dent in her funding, the stipend Diavolo had created for the exchange students was more than adequate.

“I’ve sent you 10,000 Grimm,” she said with a sigh and a wry smile. “Make it last this time; I know for a fact you just got paid yesterday.”

His eyes lit up like she’d just offered him a lifetime supply of cup noodles. “For real? Are you an angel?" The way he gripped her biceps moved her just enough to wobble the tray in her lap.

She looked herself over, making a show of it. “Still not bright enough, ‘fraid not.” It was embarrassing whenever he said that. She felt hot all over. It was the worst when he said it in front of Simeon and Luke.

An annoyed huff sounded to her right. “I heard you humans like to do good deeds but you’re just enabling him.” Belphegor teetered in his chair and stared up at the tree canopy as he spoke. 

She’d bet her entire account worth of Grimm that Belphegor had just been too lazy to pull his shoes on after he’d kicked them off.

“Hey, shaddup you!” Mammon said, releasing her to turn and glare at his brother.

Belphegor yawned and stretched, tilting the chair further back, pointing his toes as he did so. “It’s not fair of you to play favourites.” 

“No, playin’ involved,” Mammon said. “Of course I’m her favourite. I’m the most awesome there’s ever been.”

“You being right always ends up costing me something,” she muttered to Belphegor. She wanted to be mad at him for interrupting her time with Beelzebub, but looking down to where his feet had prodded her during his stretch, she saw that he had returned to keeping her tray steady with the tips of his toes. If not for him, Mammon’s excitement would’ve ended in her being scalded horribly. She picked up her D.D.D. and heard a soft ding from one of Belphegor’s inner pockets.

"You better not have given this to the others!” Mammon said, eyeing Belphegor who was reaching for his D.D.D. slowly. “You can only give it to me, got it?"

“Yes, dear,” she said, keeping her tone even. She continued typing on her D.D.D. and missed the deep red of Mammon’s blush.

“G-Good. I'll praise ya for tryin' to win the Great Mammon over, even with such a tiny tribute,” he said, his hand going to the back of his neck. He wandered away to her table and then her window, still talking to himself. “I mean it’s an honour to help the great Mammon out."

“Don’t worry, Mammon,” Belphegor said, “you’re still her only sugar baby.”

“Oi! I don’t need a sugarmama. I’m _the_ Mammon. I just need one lucky break and I’ll be swimmin’ in it again.”

This time _her_ D.D.D. pinged. **Transaction to the Lord of Sloth Declined.** Hmm.

Ping

Ping

Ping

Ping

The notifications came in rapid succession and she set her D.D.D. to silent. They’d figure it out.

Belphegor sighed loudly and began to type.

* * *

**House of Lamentation (New) (8):**

**19:03**

**L3V1:** Does this look like a phishing scam to you?

 **L3V1:** Screenshot 42 at 19.03.jpg

 **NotTodaySatan:** Perhaps? I’ve also received a similar one.

 **NotTodaySatan:** Did your message have a subject heading?

 **AsmoBaby:** Mine says “For My Pact Demons”

 **NotTodaySatan:** That is identical to mine. It does seem suspect.

 **NotTodaySatan:** Was there any other text attached to it?

 **AsmoBaby:** Oh, Satan. A gentleman never kisses and tells.

 **L3V1:** You always tell! Even when we beg you not to!

 **L3V1:** Mine says: Pick out your favourite accessory from YuruYuri:

 **L3V1:** For Whatever Reason, 

**L3V1:** Never Ending, 

**L3V1:** Heart Throbbing, 

**L3V1:** Pitter-patter, 

**L3V1:** Paradox Eternal

 **Belphie:** Why did you need to write the title out over six messages?

 **L3V1:** Each part of YuruYuri is important enough to merit its own line.

> … * **L3V1** is typing* 

**Lucifer:** My D.D.D. attempted to buzz off of my desk. DO NOT explain the title here.

> … ***NotTodaySatan** is typing* 

**Beelzeburger:** Really? Mine says “Sorry I missed dessert. Pick something out to share?”

> … ***NotTodaySatan** is typing* 

**Belphie:** It’s real. I just watched her send it.

> … ***NotTodaySatan** is typing* 

**L3V1:** Wait, what did yours say, Satan?

> … ***NotTodaySatan** is typing* 

**Lucifer:** I thought we had a discussion about not spoiling them so much?

 **NotTodaySatan:** Levi, is that the one where horrendous drawings come to life:

 **NotTodaySatan:** The one with the handsome prince?

 **NotTodaySatan:** With the hideous girl? 

**NotTodaySatan:** I don’t know that I can believe it ends in true love as they say.

 **NotTodaySatan:** But what can one expect from a direct release special?

> … * **L3V1** is typing* 

**Lucifer:** Satan, I raised you better than this.

**L3V1:**

> ****

**L3V1:** HOW DARE YOU! 

**L3V1:** You don’t understand the art and nuance that is available to a short release!

 **L3V1:** There are no commercial breaks to interrupt pacing!

 **L3V1:** There’s no need to create a new cliff hanger every week!

 **L3V1:** The director can rely directly on the art and the story telling!

> … * **L3V1** is typing* 

  
**NotTodaySatan:** Apparently, you didn’t.

* * *

“Mammon, stop snooping in my room!” she said trying to peer past Belphegor and her tree. He was making his usual rounds, poking through her collections of shiny bits and bobs, cataloguing them in his mind.

“Not snoopin,’” he said, ignoring his own D.D.D.s pings and ducking into her bathroom.

* * *

**Pact in Blood (2):**

**Belphegor:** I don’t want it. Buy me a pillow instead. 

She looked over at Belphegor and raised an eyebrow at him, but he was too busy looking at his D.D.D. to see it.

**MC:** You have a million pillows.

**Belphegor:** Beel forgets they’re not marshmallows in his sleep.

**Belphegor:** I also don’t have one just for you when you sleep over.

* * *

“I want you to pick it out,” Belphegor said, finally looking at her. He nudged the tray to sit more evenly on her lap and drew his legs back so that he was hunched over his knees to look at her, the chair still tilted beneath him. Her own pretty gargoyle.

Leviathan’s towel in hand, Mammon returned from the bathroom. “Why do you have Levi’s towel?” he asked. He thrust the blue towel out ahead of him, waving it as if they were the answers to next week’s geography test and she wasn’t going to share. 

“Because he visited me after swim time for an illicit tryst and I’m hiding him under my bed,” she said completely deadpan. 

“WHAT?”

“Mammon,” she said as he stared at her bed, “I borrowed it since mine was too damp.” She watched him glance between her and the base of the bed again, staring at the missing sideboards that gave access to the underside. Boards  _ he’d _ broken when roughhousing with Beelzebub. 

“He probably just jumped back in his aquarium after anyways,” she said. Telling  _ The Mammon _ that she bawled her eyes out until she fell asleep wasn’t at the top of her list of things to do today. She’d be the weak human forever then. 

He ‘ _ hmmph _ ’d’ before dropping the towel onto the floor, choosing to sit on the end of her bed and give her the stink eye instead of putting it in the hamper.

“Sorry, Belphegor, what were you saying?” she asked. The barely there sensation of the tray being readjusted was still tingling on the tops of her thighs. She swallowed thickly, trying to pull herself together.

“I said I like you. I'm just tired of trying to get your attention.” His expression, like his delivery, was completely blank.

“What?” she and Mammon said in unison.

“What, isn’t that the game we were playing?” he asked, obviously unperturbed as he reclined back into his chair once more.

“Pfft. Of course we were,” Mammon said, “Just had to make sure ya felt like you were winnin’ sometimes. Big brother stuff.” Caught up in his own bluster, he didn’t see Belphegor lean his head to the side to catch their human’s eye.

She laughed secretly with Belphegor when she saw the faint tug of a smile at the corners of his mouth. His words had made her heartbeat stutter with surprise. It had her thinking of the compromising position they’d woken up in together. 

“I said, we heard you’re down for the count,” Belphegor said.

Usually, watching her demons carefully helped smooth out any difficulties, but today it was working against her. She could see the tense rise and fall of Belphegor’s chest and the way his arm, casually hanging at his side, ended in a tight fist around his D.D.D. 

Beelzebub had mentioned that one could often feel the other’s lust. Perhaps he was as worked up as she was? More likely he was annoyed as he would already be sleeping if it weren’t for her over-revved system borrowing Beelzebub for her own selfish wants.

She flushed at the still recent memory and kept herself from looking in the direction of the kitchen and Beelzebub, poking at her soup with her spoon instead. It was no longer boiling hot but it gurgled at her. ‘Alarming,’ she thought, eyes widening.

“It’s definitely edible,” Belphegor said, his words pitched to reassure. “Satan double checked.”

“I taste tested,” Mammon said from his place at the end of her bed, his mood improving quickly with something else to focus on. “Definitely good.”

“Cockatrice good? Or chicken good?” she asked.

“Chicken,” they said in unison, one excited and the other bored.

She slurped at the broth in her spoon experimentally. It didn’t match the nostalgia of chicken noodle, but it was good and she appreciated the attempt. ‘Levi to the rescue again,’ she thought.

“So, what’s wrong with you,” Belphegor asked bluntly.

“Just tired,” she said, raising the bowl to her mouth and foregoing the spoon altogether.

He stared at her: his sleepy eyes were half closed in boredom with one raised eyebrow to convey his skepticism. “Tired?” he asked, as if he’d misheard her. The corners of his mouth turned down just enough to not be amused.

Maybe a poor description in his company, given that he was looking at her as if she didn’t understand the meaning of the word. “Let’s call it culture shock then,” she said.

“That doesn’t make any sense, you’ve been here for months now,” Mammon said.

“And I haven’t taken a break yet,” she said between slurps of her soup. “You seven are quite a handful, not to mention RAD.”

“What do you mean, you seven?” said Mammon, bristling like a cat, “Don’t lump me in with them!”

Belphegor nodded slowly in agreement. “I should never be in the same category as Mammon.”

“Hey! Show some respect,” Mammon said. His eyebrows were beginning to move down to create a furrow.

“I should make biscuits next time we have soup,” she said, musing to herself as she set down the now empty bowl. Belphegor's comment was little different from Mammon’s so she’d let the weak insult slide this once. “Maybe I’ll do that tomorrow.”

“Hey, don't ignore me!”

Taking the tray away from her with his tail, Belphegor gave a nod that seemed mildly impressed that the soup had disappeared so quickly. “Nope, no cooking duty for you tomorrow. Satan offered to take Levi's shift since he took yours today.”

“I should be fine by tomorrow,” she said, fiddling with the edge of her blanket. “I just need to do less, not nothing.” Her face was becoming painfully red as she tried to push away the lurid images of her 'nothing happened' time with Asmodeus earlier. It’s a good thing his walls were soundproofed.

“I'd love to taste one of your biscuits,” Belphegor said.

Was she imagining things? He  _ was  _ staring at her. No, it was just because she’d been thinking of Asmodeus. She was being a pervert. Anything could be misconstrued after that. Belphegor’s just being nice to the sickie.

“Hey, no reason ta be embarrassed,” Mammon said. “You're gettin' the hang of it, aren't ya? You’ll be better in no time and ready to take on this new business opportunity I just found!”

And he’d started out so sweetly too. Unfortunate. 

“No dice,” she said. Her hand sliced through the air horizontally, cutting down his pitch before it could start. “I’m taking a week off from schemes.” 

“It’s not a scheme…” he said, “but, I guess weak and fragile humans do need ta pace the amount of awesome they’re a part of.”

“Mammon,” she said. Her voice had an edge to it that took even her by surprise. “I do _ not _ have the patience for being called weak today.”

He froze like a rabbit after a hawk shriek, waiting for talons to pierce him.

“ **Come here** ,” she said softly, patting beside her on the side of the bed furthest from Belphegor’s white socked feet.

Belphegor smirked at Mammon as he was bent to the will of her command.

Wrapping her fluffy pajama arms around Mammon, she pulled him down so that he was partially reclined against her chest. “Don’t struggle,” she said, tutting as he flailed. “You’ll injure the fragile human.”

He stilled immediately. “You've got some nerve makin' THE Mammon—”

“Ah,” she said, uncrossing one arm from around him to hold up a finger in his face, “I can’t be weak if I have THE Mammon, now can I?” She petted his hair as he blushed and stuttered.

“Listen, you do know I'm a DEMON, right?” 

He made a show up trying to get up, but she wasn’t concerned; he had enough strength in his pinky finger to easily extricate himself. 

“S-S-Stop it!”

Using both hands to massage his scalp, she watched him melt under her attention. She looked to Belphegor and rolled her eyes at the situation.

“You are a curious one,” Belphegor said, shaking his head before changing the subject. “Think you can manage to eat dessert?”

She nodded to him, and continued petting a nearly comatose Mammon. Her fingers brushed down his neck to his shoulders, starting to dip under his collar, only to run back into his hair.

“Hehe. He's in his happy place,” Belphegor said, but his lazy smile didn’t last. He let his chair fall forward with a bang keeping eye contact with her all the while. Leaning forward deeply, his elbows over his spread knees, feet now planted on the floor, he watched her hands for a moment before retrieving one of them from Mammon hair. “You know you don’t have to give him everything he asks for?”

It should have felt cozy with Mammon flopped on her, but Belphegor’s hand now in hers, she realized her heart was beating just a little too fast. The hand he’d taken had been about to slide from Mammon’s collarbone to his sternum. She didn’t know whether to curse or praise Asmodeus. The lech had peeled back the inhibitions she’d managed to maintain for half a year, and now her libido was on a rampage trying to make up for lost time.

“You go get it,” Mammon said petulantly, but there wasn’t much force behind it with that dopey smile on his face.

Clearly, she’d spaced out, lost in her thoughts and the platonic equilibrium she was trying to keep during impromptu cuddles. She was lucky, Mammon didn’t usually allow himself to be coddled for long when others were present, not unless he could gloat about it.

“Lucifer put it on the highest shelf so Beel wouldn’t eat it right away. You have wings,” Belphegor said, his words even and rational.

Mammon sat up before she could remove her hand from his hair. “Fine, but it’s not like I’m doing it just ‘cause Lucifer put it aside.” He slid to the bottom of the bed, and stood only to push the end away from the wall before making his way toward the door.

She was sure he was checking that Leviathan wasn’t actually under her bed, but he managed to stalk out of the room without looking back.

“I didn’t realize you had such a love of dessert,” Belphegor said, caressing the back of her hand with his thumb.

“Well, it’s hard not to like sweets,” she said, letting herself relax and tease him. “You can hardly judge; I’ve seen you with plenty of candy. Well, when Beel doesn’t get to it first.” She regretted mentioning Beelzebub the moment it came out of her mouth.

Something predatory danced in his eyes and she swallowed thickly.

“You do seem quite tired,” he said instead, pushing up her sleeve with his other hand and running his palm over her exposed skin as if he were looking for something. “Are you sure you’re up for dessert when you’re this tired?”

She nodded rather than trust her mouth to make words while Belphegor continued to oversensitize her skin. He looked like he was going to devour her every time he said dessert. ‘I’m a mess today,’ she thought. ‘This is precisely why I need to rest! Fatigued humans are emotional, poor-choice-making humans!’

“Good,” he said, and she could feel goosebumps tracking their way down her sides and arms.

“I love it wet and juicy, and in a nice pinky-red colour,” he said, now massaging her hand.

She swallowed again, watching him, trying to rationalize his soft and sultry tone against what she knew was her own sex-addled thoughts.

“Sometimes it gets my hands sticky but I don't mind.”

She bit her lip, and tried not to break eye contact. It felt like breaking eye contact would be a bad thing.

The sound of the door opening behind her was like the release valve being triggered on a pressure cooker. “Watermelon is amazing,” Belphegor said with a gentle smile and a pat of her hand.

‘For fuck’s sake!’ she thought. Apparently, today was also an eye-fucking day.

“I got some dessert for ya. Be grateful and take it!” Mammon said, kicking the door closed behind him. He returned to stand at "his side" of the bed as grumpily as he had left.

Her hands, suddenly empty now, were free to receive the plate from Mammon and set it on her lap.

Watermelon. It was watermelon.

“T-Thank you, Mammon,” she said, cursing the small stammer and the well of embarrassed heat that was trying to rush to her face.

“Open your mouth,” she heard from her right. There was Belphegor holding a slice.

“Hey, Oi! No one’s feedin’ her except me!” Mammon said.

She looked between them.

“Don’t make me tell you twice,” Belphegor said, leveling her with a look that promised punishment.

Opening her mouth the slightest amount, she bit into the pink flesh, and moved to take it from his hand.

“Hey, what did I just say!” Mammon asked, his arms were out wide. He stepped away from his self-appointed post and began to walk around the bed toward Belphegor.

“Can’t have you getting your hands all sticky.” Belphegor swatted her reaching hand away. “We’d have to wash you up then.”

“Wash her up?” Mammon repeated with a hint of daze, tripping over the towel he’d left at the foot of her bed.

“But, as I said, I don’t mind.”

His words sounded so caring and sweet. ‘My lewd mind is going to get me into so much trouble,’ she thought.

“Quit that!” Mammon said, and grabbed for Belphegor’s wrist. He only succeeded in pressing the watermelon slice against her already closed teeth, and juice sluiced down her chin.

“Mammon,” Belphegor said, gesturing with his free hand, “Look what you did.” His words seemed oddly devoid of their usual annoyance.

“What, that was you! I’m not—”

“Would you just go grab a towel from the bathroom?” Belphegor asked, his bored irritation having finally returned full force.

Mammon fumed and turned on his heel, stomping into the other room to look through her cabinets and cupboards unsupervised.

As soon as Mammon disappeared Belphegor’s free hand tangled in the hair at the base of her skull. He pulled her head back forcefully to lap up the juice that had made its way down her neck, tasting her in one slow sweep of his tongue.

Her deep breath was the only sound in the room, surprise silencing her whine of want as he followed a straight line up to the corner of her mouth.

“You’re right, I do love sweet things,” he whispered and released her as quickly as he’d grabbed her.

“Here’s your towel,” Mammon said, standing in the doorway and holding the towel high with his declaration.

“Mammon, that’s my wet bath mat,” she said flatly, still trying to make sense of her world.

He huffed and turned around to go collect something dry that also resembled a towel.

Immediately, Belphegor’s fist returned to her hair, and he drank up a different watermelon flow that had run down to her clavicle.

“Belphegor?” she asked breathlessly.

He nipped her jaw and let her go again.

Was she still asleep and torturing herself with this wet dream? The heat in her belly demanded she pull him back to her so she could make sense of things.

“Here, I know this one is a hand towel,” Mammon said, striding back to the bed. He knelt on the bed and gently mopped at her mouth.

“I'm one of seven rulers of the Devildom! Mammon, the Avatar of Greed, and I’m stuck playing nursemaid to a fragile human…” he said. His words were muttered angrily, but his touch was exceptionally gentle.

It would be easy enough to clean herself up, but letting Mammon fuss over her would stop a fight before it started. She tried to make sure sincere gratefulness made it into her words when she locked eyes with him. “Thank you, Mammon,” she said after he’d turned her face this way and that.

“I can watch her for you for a couple minutes,” Belphegor said, yawning to cover his smile.

“Nah, It’s my job. I gotta do it.”

Her glazed eyes and flushed skin began to fade. Did he always have to say it like he was stuck with her? She knew it wasn’t like that, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt to hear him say it.

“You’ve had months with her though, big brother…”

Mammon paused and she watched him his usual complaints screech to a halt. It must’ve been a long time since anyone had actually called him big brother, other than himself. She’d certainly never heard it said. 

Eyes wide as he tilted his head forward, Mammon scratched his fingertips into the hair at his temple. "W...well that's because, uh... you know... I've gotta look after this human, don't I? Lucifer’d have my head...." He brought his hand to scratch the back of his head awkwardly.

Dejectedly, Belphegor looked at the soggy watermelon in his hand.

That’s when she saw the last of Mammon’s objections fall away. His eyes looked softly on Belphegor, with little lines at the corners betraying the tenderness he always tried to hide. She should have expected that he’d want to immediately cover it up. 

“Fine, fine. Do what you want. Just no touchin’. Can’t have you gettin’ your germs all over the human.” 

They both blinked at him. Wasn’t she supposed to be the sick one?

“I'm gonna get goin’ now. I'm a busy guy, ya know,” Mammon said, tossing the towel to Belphegor. “Satan and Asmo said they’d stop by later to say good night; try not to fall asleep until then!” He closed the door, off to start his next project.

* * *

But he paused on the other side of the closed door, torn. He wanted to be the one to feed her and tuck her in, to receive her smiles and thanks. ‘‘I never can tell what Belphie's thinkin'. Hate that about him.’ 

He sighed and started walking. ‘I just want her all to myself, at least for a little while.’


	19. Playing favourites

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor puts his cards on the table.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for reviewing my updates to these early chapters <3

Belphegor hadn’t lied, she’d spent very little time with him in comparison with the others. Even after helping him get over the awkwardness with his brothers, her fear had remained. She suspected they’d only made up with him at first so that she wouldn’t be left alone in his company when they’d inevitably leave any room he was in.

For the first few weeks of his freedom, she hadn't stayed in a room alone with him for longer than necessary. It was only in the last couple of months that he'd begun stealing her for nap time, or sneaking into her bed the way Mammon did. He’d crept closer and closer each time until she was finally comfortable enough to sleep against him.

Still, she watched with trepidation as Mammon left. Something felt very different.

‘No, I just need to get my stupid body under control,’ she thought. ‘Belphie loves to prank everyone and play jokes. He’s clearly bored and trying to get a rise out of me.’ She was determined to wait him out until he tired of his new game. It would be easy enough to command him to stop, but it was such a tempting relief after Beelzebub had left her alone so abruptly. The startling attention soothed just a little bit of that remaining heat. More of her enjoyed it than was probably healthy. It didn’t matter, soon everyone would have come to say their good nights, Belphegor would be shooed away, and then she’d finally have time to sort through the day on her own.

“He really does talk too much,” Belphegor said, lifting another slice of watermelon in his hand.

“Each bird loves to hear himself sing,” she said noncommittally before biting into the slice he brought to her mouth.

He took the next bite for himself, sucking noisily. “You may not be aware, but sharing feelings with Beelzebub doesn’t just end at guilt or hunger," he said, pausing to look at her knowingly. "We’re betwixt and between, you might say.” He watched her face heat and enjoyed her abashed expression before feeding her the next bite. “Imagine my surprise when not once, but twice, today I felt lust coursing through me. It made my shift at the mausoleum very uncomfortable.”

“I…Um. Sorry about that?” she said, and averted her gaze, unconsciously bringing her hand to protect the juncture of her shoulder and neck.

As he fed her, he pulled her guarding hand away. “Now, why might that be?” he asked, “I thought you didn’t play favourites.”

He didn’t remove the slice until she had finished it, holding it closer as she ate through it and making a mess of her cheeks.

When she reached for the hand towel he moved it away. “Ah, ah,” he said as he cleaned off his own fingers with it, “I promised to look after you.”

“You said you’d watch me,” she replied with little enthusiasm, trying to squeegee some of the juice from her cheek towards her mouth.

“Are you offering to put on a show?” he asked, his eyes dancing with delight.

He smirked openly at her unguarded shock. Damn it. She was letting him get to her.

“I didn’t think so. So, let me take care of you.” He took the plate from her and set it aside, sidling up to her on the bed, towel in hand. “As much as I enjoy making a mess of you,” he said, with a sigh, “You seem uncomfortable, so I guess I’ll just have to clean you up for now.”

He did so no differently than Mammon had, but it felt worlds different. Each dab of the cloth seemed more sensitive than before. The way his fingers lay under her jaw and chin to tilt her face toward or away from him was actually more gentle than Mammon’s motions had been. 

It was a little more comfortable without watermelon all over her face. It was also less comfortable with the new type of closeness that confused her. A ‘thank you’ was on her lips, but he spoke before she had the chance.

“Much to my surprise," he continued, "I had to consider making my way to the washroom to relieve myself.” He dropped the towel in her lap.

She squeezed her eyes shut and wrinkled her nose in discomfort, only peeking one eye open to look at him. “Sorry,” she said. Her voice was pinched, still uncertain whether she was supposed to be apologizing.

“I have to assume you  _ are _ playing favourites now,” he said, his eyes narrowed, condemning her as he leaned in closer. “After all, I told you I was yours, but you’ve decided to manipulate my sweet, and timid brother instead.”

“It was only a kiss,” she said, crossing her arms with a huff.

He gave her some space, and tapped his chin in thought. “Hmm, well maaaaybe this morning might have been a kiss, but judging by the state of the weight room I do have my doubts...”

“It was just a kiss, Belphie,” she said, a little more defensively now. ‘When was he even in the weight room?’ she wondered, reappraising the Avatar of Sloth.

“I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt,” he said, with a lazy wave of his hand, “but, during dinner…” He sucked a deep breath through his teeth and fixed her with a knowing stare.

“Still just a kiss,” she said stubbornly.

“ _Hnnn_.” He wouldn’t push it, instead he opened his arms to her. “Come here.” His body language was relaxed but he still sounded bossy.

She looked at him like a fly would a spider.

“I promise not to do anything untoward,” he said, reaching out to cup her cheek and stroke it with his thumb. He used a gentle pressure along her jaw to tilt her head ever so slightly to the side and down, guiding her body language to mimic an intimate interest. “You had no problem cuddling this morning, today shouldn’t change that.” He tapped her chin with this thumb and pulled away.

His words seemed genuine, and she had no doubts about his want to protect her now, so she shuffled over and he rested her body between his thighs. Cradled her between his bent knees and his chest, with his hands to himself, he’d helped position her there much as he had on movie nights. That in mind, on those nights, he was usually doing it to annoy Mammon.

To her surprise, when she relaxed against him Belphegor sighed contentedly and slowly began to comb his fingers through her hair. They stayed like that until she realized she was almost as bad as Mammon. If it were any worse, she’d whine and nuzzle into Belphegor’s hand for the comfort and skinship. He’d tired of his game sooner than she’d thought, but she wasn’t disappointed with the attention that now replaced it.

But then his hands fell away, leaving her feeling colder. From her periphery she could tell his arms were loose at his sides.

“My heart has waited so long to be loved by someone like you,” he said, while she blinked rapidly to clear the foggy comfort from her head.

Her chest felt tight. There was nothing squeezing her except uncertainty. She tried to turn, but he held her there, bringing his arms around her to keep her still while he continued to whisper in her ear. 

“I want to exist in the spaces of your heart where no one else has ever been.” 

She leaned forward, when she felt the broken, growling thrum of Infernal speech under his words, and he let her move away. It sounded plaintive and needy; it stoked a warmth in her that she didn’t want to admit to. “Belphie…” 

“Please, don’t leave me behind,” he said, pulling her back to rest against him again.

She brought a hand up to his joined hands around her chest. “I’m feeling too much today, Belphie. I want to answer you, but I know that my head isn’t clear,” She patted his hands softly with hers and waited for his reply. ‘Good job!’ she thought. ‘Clear, concise, solidly firm response. No wiggle room for clever demons there!’ 

“Let me touch your mind and set your body on fire,” he said, sighing the words into her ear. 

Fuck. This wasn’t a debate or negotiation. He really should be the one teaching their Seductive Speechcraft course. His words were so soft, tempting; she could almost feel her body trying to clench around the sound of his voice.

“Belphegor,” she said in warning, but it held little steel to it as she shivered. If she’d wanted to remove him, she could. It just felt so good to be wanted, and not in the “I guess you’re okay for a human” kind of way that the others always had ready for her. Maybe for just a little longer? No, she needed to think carefully. She doubted he’d play with her feelings to this level if it were a prank; if she gave him an inch now there was no telling what it would mean to him. 

Mindful of the vulnerability he was showing her, with him still hidden behind her back, she decided to pull them back into banter where it was safer. “Are you feeling a little jealous today, oh Slothful One?”

“I'm not jealous, I'm territorial,” he said, his voice dipping low and dangerous as his hands skated up her sides, and his lips skirted along the shell of her ear.

Her body responded without her permission, inhaling sharply in response to the simultaneous sensations. ‘How is it that he can make me melt and tense at the same time?’ she wondered, closing her eyes and working to slow her heartbeat. She imagined how the tips of his claws would feel over her bare skin.

“Jealousy is when you want something that's not yours,” he said, as his right hand travelled to her throat. “Territorial is protecting what's already yours.” 

She wanted to say his name again but she didn’t know how she wanted to say it. ‘Let me go. Keep going. I don’t play favourites. Tighter. What are you thinking?’ It was impossible to express them all at once, and so she remained silent as his left hand reached across her rib cage to keep her firmly in place against him.

“You’re constantly making it hard for me to behave when I'm with you,” he said, nipping her ear.

She whimpered when he tightened his grip on her throat. He seemed unconcerned by the noise and she kept her hands loose on his thighs to keep it that way. The way he pulled her closer and down had her grinding her ass back into him.

“Not so long ago, I told you your present was meo. Now, offer yourself to me as well,” he said.

She pressed her lips into a tight line.

“Say yes and I will be rough with you in so many sweet ways,” he promised. The fluffy pajamas she wore should have taken the intensity out of his touch with their ridiculousness, but they didn’t. Instead, it felt impossibly soft as his hand around her kept pressure and drew back to slide up between her breasts.

She arched against him, baring her neck while attempting not to dig her nails into his thighs. If he let her lift any higher she’d be able to sit in his lap.

"I would treasure you and protect you always," he said, still holding her in place by the throat and sternum, his fingers barely shy of cupping her breast. “Just submit to me, and I  _ swear to you _ , I won't stop until your legs are shaking and the neighbours know my name.” He loosened his grip on her throat and let her rest, her breathing heavy between him despite the harsh grip he kept on her torso.

After the tension drained out of her, when she felt like a puddle of jelly, his hands fell to her shoulder and waist, and she almost hummed in contentment despite her confusion. “Give me some time?” she asked as she craned her neck back to look up at him, her face flushed and her eyes wanting.

“On one condition,” he said, clearly trying not to look as put out as he felt and failing miserably. “I get as many kisses as Beel receives until you decide."

As she thought it over, she leaned forward to turn around and face him. His arms stuttered back from their places around her as if they’d already become rusty from disuse, stalling her and giving away his hesitation.

“To be claimed when I wish,” he said, as if it had already been decided.

“Okay,” she said, cupping her hands around his face and leaning in. Best to do this while she still had the courage, before she had a chance to think about what he was actually asking of her. “Two then.” She brought her lips to his tentatively, even though everything in her wanted to rush.

On his best behaviour it seemed, he let her hands slide down his neck to his chest and didn’t reach for her. If only he weren’t wearing his sweater still, the buckles always bit into her.

He continued waiting until she slowly poured herself into his embrace and his mouth. Much too slowly. His arms came around her again, crushing her to him, and she let out a startled squeak before kissing him more deeply. He moaned at the change.

Off balance, and captured in his embrace, she had no way to touch more of him, even if she could think straight enough to do so. She could feel the solid thickness of his cock pressed between them, a brand against her skin to show how much he was holding back. Fuck, she wanted to take more than just his moans into her mouth.

One of his hands slid to the dip of her spine, pressing her against him further, making certain she knew what she did to him. That hand slowly rose back up, taking the hem of her shirt with it, but never losing pressure as he rolled her body against him. Taking control of the kiss with his other hand, he angled her mouth for greater access, bending her backward. 

She felt light headed, overwhelmed, but oh so good. 'Spirits above and below.’ She just wanted to fall back and have him ravish her. He seemed the sort to keep her with her knees bent under her too. Despite the way she was already clinging to him, it was her thoughts that embarrassed her. 'How can this be only one kiss?' So wrong but so right. 

Slowing, as her hands fisted in his shirt, he allowed the kiss to grow more shallow, only releasing his grip around her body when their lips had parted.

He cupped her cheek and used it to guide his lips to her other cheek for a chaste peck. “Waiting is hard, especially when I can feel you with Beel, but I'll spend as much time alone as I have to if it means I'll eventually have your love.” 

‘Deep even breaths,’ she reminded herself and worked on taking responsibility for her own precarious balance without his arms around her. ‘Did he mean it?’

He moved quietly out of her bed while she collected herself and, looking away from her, he fluffed the pillows and rearranged them. 

When she’d finished adjusting her clothing and smoothing down her hair, he sat on the bed again, this time with enough space between them that another person could have cozily fit there. He took her hand again, brushing his thumb softly over it.

‘He can’t know how much that alone is enough to keep me on fire,’ she thought, biting her lip harshly and looking away.

“I’ll count that as a freebie since I didn’t claim it,” he said with a wink and a squeeze of her hand. 

Her eyes shot up to meet his, scandalized, but a quick rap on the door signalled Asmodeus and Satan letting themselves in before she could scold Belphegor. They couldn’t see the look of playful outrage Belphegor received as he dropped her hand and collected the plates, leaving her there, steaming.

'What have I gotten myself into?' she wondered.


	20. Finest Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Satan and Asmodeus do their duty and check in on the human.
> 
> Satan stays to read.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

“There’s our sweet mistress!” Asmodeus said, bounding from the door and into bed next to her swiftly.

“We brought some water,” Satan said evenly and placed the glass and pitcher nearby.

“Oh, my Dearest, you look exhausted. You need to be taking better care of yourself if you’re going to keep up with demonic activities!” Asmodeus said, as if he wasn’t at least partially to blame for her exhaustion.

She raised an eyebrow at him, but she left it at that. It was nice to see him back to his usual flirtatious self. If things would remain normal afterwards, maybe it wouldn't be so bad to go to him from time to time. It has been a long dry spell after all. 

Truly, she was simply relieved that nothing had really changed between them. “It’s nice to see you both too,” she said.

Retrieving book after book from an overly large bag, Satan began to stack them next to her bed until she could snag one without leaning over the side. “I’ve also brought some reading material, including your ‘ _ light reading’ _ ,” Satan said.

“Thank you, that’s very kind of you,” she said before she was distracted by her hand yet again being taken up by someone else.

Asmodeus surveilled her nails. “We’re going to have to get our nails done together. Nails like these leave marks after all!”

There was that knowing glint she was expecting from him. “That sounds nice,” she said noncommittal, refusing to play into his game. “Maybe when I’m a little more energetic.”

“You know if you’re feeling down, I can feel you up,” he said, quick with his counter while his hands began to travel further up her arm.

“Asmo,” Satan said, the reprimand in his voice obvious as he took a seat in the empty chair next to the bed.

With all the well wishers she’d received, it was as if she was hospitalized. All that was missing was flowers and balloons, not that she’d have room for them anywhere, but knowing Asmodeus he’d make room for flowers.

“Now this one here,” Satan began as he sat down in Belphegor’s abandoned seat. “Is a particular favourite of mine.” He proceeded to tell her about each book, looking just shy of jubilant when discussing how much she would enjoy ‘The Ice Harvest’ and ‘The Big Sleep.’ 

It brought her to wonder why all the books with flashy exteriors started with “The.” She smiled at her own comparison of ‘The’ Great Mammon and how he matched the pattern.

Already bored of the reviews and summaries, Asmodeus took Mammon’s proclaimed side of the bed, next to the wall, and picked up her D.D.D. “Oh my. You’ll definitely be busy reading tonight,” Asmodeus said, wiggling the D.D.D. in his hand at her. “Forty-six unread messages!”

She reached out for it, concerned by the number of missed messages, but Asmodeus stretched to his full height and held the device over his head. “What have we here?” he asked, flashing it at Satan instead.

“Looks like a new phone charm,” Satan said, uninterested, and clearly wanting to discuss the newest series he had in hand. 

“It looks like a new phone charm, from Mammon,” Asmodeus said, enunciating each word with a teasing lilt, as if he could lick chocolate slowly off of each vowel given enough time.

“Yeah, Belphie mentioned that this morning too,” she said, refusing to fall back into his arms. She reached for the phone again and used Asmodeus’s shoulder to pull herself upward a small degree. If Satan hadn’t come with so many books, which he’d clearly put forethought into sharing, she would’ve been sorely tempted to drag Asmodeus down to her level using only her lips.

Satan rolled his eyes and began to sort each book into smaller 'more manageable' piles for her.

“Well, I think it’s very sweet the way Mammon’s trying to stake his claim,” Asmodeus said, his expression hungry and focused. 

The heat of Asmodeus’s breath fanned against her cheek and she sat back down quickly, trying to stuff down the surge of lust that had flared up in her. “Don’t be silly,” she said hastily. “It’s just a charm not a marriage proposal, now give me my D.D.D. so I can call for help.” Her bossy look garnered her a sigh, but the D.D.D. made it back into her hands. Now, if only her nipples would stop trying to poke through her fluffy pajama top, she might not look like one of the wanton harlots from one of the books Satan kept poorly hidden in his bathroom closet.

“WELL! Now that I am assured of your well being,” Asmodeus said, “I will take my leave. I have a hot date tonight!” 

Satan strummed his gloved fingers on the hardcover of the book in his lap, his impatience clearly growing.

“I hope you have an excellent time,” she said and meant it, even if she was already missing the small relief Asmodeus’ recent closeness had brought to her neglected libido. She almost wanted to punish Beelzebub for revving her up like this, only to leave her in his brothers’ care.

“I won’t be exhausting myself, if that’s what you mean,” Asmodeus said, pinning her with another appraising look, this one less flirty than before. “If you haven’t already, you really should take my advice, you know? Humans need to listen to their bodies.” He brought his hand to his chin, fanning his fingers across his cheek before tilting his head to the side in a pose of cutesy thought. “I hear human instincts help keep you safe.”

“Thank you, Asmo,” she said dully, having heard this lecture too many times before.

“Well, I suppose today is the first day of thinking about yourself. Just make sure to pace yourself,” he said with a wink. “After all, you’re invited to make it a threesome if I decide to bring him home with me.”

“Would you get out of here, you fiend!” she said with a smile on her face, and a pillow in hand, her arm cocked back and ready to throw.

“He’s very handsome. You’re missing out!”

Satan shook his head and, instead of commenting, asked a reasonable question. "Why is your bed angled away from the wall?" His eyes rolled again the moment she said 'Mammon' but he stood and pulled the top of the bed away from the wall as well so that she was no longer askew. "No point in putting it back in place; his pea-brain likely had a reason so he's sure to repeat it," he said, muttering the last half mostly to himself.

With alacrity, he returned to his chair and started back in on the pros and cons of each series; she did her best to follow along. Usually, their book discussions were riveting but today had been full of so much touch and sensation that she was well and truly tired. And frustrated.

Checking her messages covertly, while nodding along to Satan's reading of a passage, she saw that most were from Leviathan or Mammon: worried about their human though they'd never admit it aloud. 

There was one from Asmo, letting her know under no uncertain terms how much he would enjoy repeating their interlude. His graphic choice of words had her blushing despite her attempts to remain neutral in the face of Satan's book review.

No wonder she was tired. ‘I doubt humans are meant to withstand this level of doki doki,' she thought. The looks she’d received from Asmodeus felt more heated now, and remembering the corresponding movements that had previously accompanied those looks definitely added to their power. She shook away the phantom sensation of the many hands that had held her today and opened her D.D.D.’s camera app.

“Did you just take a picture of the books?” Satan asked, a frown beginning to form as he tried to assess her level of interest.

“Yes, I wanted to show Levi that I have reading material,” she said, trying to smile brightly for him, and gloss over the fact that she was only partially paying attention.

“Send Manga!” along with a picture of the many small stacks of books that hemmed her in went out to Leviathan.

Instead of discussing the picture, Satan once again scrutinized her, this time without the look of suspicion. “It might take a while for him to respond,” he said carefully, measuring her reaction. “You did quite a number on him.”

“I did what now?” she asked, her voice high and uneven. This place played havoc on her poor heart. This time all of the blood was draining from her face.

Looking down, she realized he was right; her messages asking after him, apologizing for glomming onto his tail, and asking if she’d accidentally kicked Henry, all of them were read but no replies had come.

“What I mean,” Satan said, clearly trying to placate her, “was that you were very  _ intimately _ attached when we came to help.”

“ _ We _ ?” her voice was shrill, " _ Intimately _ ? I don’t remember anything after crying. Plethora of Pantheons, I need to go apologize!” she said, kicking off her blankets and attempting to stumble toward the door.

Scooping her up before she got more than three steps, Satan deposited her right back from whence she'd come. “Yes,  _ we _ . Lucifer and I helped pry you two apart.”

Her eyes were wide as she sat in the middle of her bed. She closed her mouth, unsure where to begin her questioning. “Would you please,” she asked, taking a breath, “explain a bit further,” Deep breath. “Before I have a full freak out?” She was trying her best to stay calm. ‘Why is communication not the strong suit of ANY of my demons?’

“Nothing to fear,” he said, with a wry laugh while leisurely seating himself. He had his captive audience now and took his time. “You had an exceptional grip on his tail and could not be convinced to move.”

She blinked at him, remaining stock still.

“We had to hoist you up?” Satan said, looking for a hint of comprehension. “Actually, it was very funny to watch Lucifer carry you wrapped around Leviathan’s tail, treating it as your own Ruri-chan body pillow.”

She continued blinking, clearly waiting for more.

“We had to entice you away with warm water?” There was a slight rise to his words, as if he hoped making it a question would jog her memory.

Nothing computed for her. “But that’s it, right?”

He looked at her quizzically.

“You made it sound like I  _ molested _ him!”

He covered his laughter with his sleeve, watching her pre-teen-esque melt down. “Yes, that is all.”

“ _ Why didn’t he just untransfooorm? _ ” she asked, warbling face first into one of the pillows.

When silence met her dramatic wail she looked up from her pillow.

Satan looked stunned, his mouth lax as his eyes moved in sync with a memory she couldn’t see. A full belly laugh erupted from him, and he slapped his knee with the force of his unrestrained glee. He couldn’t breathe.

‘Does...Does he need medical assistance?’ she wondered. ‘Has he finally lost it after living with those six?’ She’d never seen him laugh like this before,

“Oh, this is the finest day of your stay,” he said hoarsely. “I’m sure of it.”

She swung her feet over the side of the bed so that she could pat his back as he choked out the words.

“There he was, just holding Levi’s tail, wrapped around you, and you wrapped around the rest of it…” he said, the last words barely squeaking out. "Completely soaked!"

“I’m glad my being carried like a roasting pig has brightened your day,” she said, though her grousing was light in tone.

He was wiping tears from his eyes, imagining it again no doubt.

“You’ll be pleased to know then that Lucifer ended up shampooing and conditioning my hair too.”

He was dying. She was sure of it. The Avatar of Wrath had slipped off of his chair, and was trying to breathe through the laughter, writhing on her floor, unable to raise his hands from his stomach even when his cheek ground into the carpet with each wracking sob of laughter.

A soft ‘ _ plunk _ ’ drew her attention away from him while he tried to collect himself at her feet. Lifting the water pitcher Satan had brought in, she found that A Little Demon now floated in it and it looked suspiciously scaly.

“Hello in there,” she said to it, bringing her pointer finger to rest against the bulbous glass bottom.

It gave a shy little wave of its own.

“It seems Leviathan won’t banish me for too long,” she said with satisfaction. 

Satan seemed pleased for her if his grin was anything to go by, and he slowly lifted himself from the rug.

His hair out of place, and his clothing rumpled, was a very good look for him. She liked the way his cheeks were pinked from mirth and the rough carpeting. 

Setting the pitcher down, she situated herself back into bed. She tried to take thoughts of Satan deliriously moaning into her carpet, jaw relaxed and mouth drooling from overstimulation, and tuck them safely back into her little container of celibacy where they belonged.

He’d been very patient, and it was time they got to reading in earnest: a nice, slow paced activity, even if her mind did wander. 

Maybe tomorrow she would call Solomon and ask him for advice.

* * *

Satan observed her book continue to fall lower and lower and how her head bobbed forward before she would blink slowly and draw the book back up again. “Would you like me to read to you, so you can rest your eyes?” he asked. It wasn’t often he had someone to read with and, truth be told, he didn’t want to leave just yet.

Nodding sleepily, she patted an empty portion of the bed.

Careful not to jostle her, he joined her, hiding his surprise when she cuddled up under one of his arms to rest her head on his chest. 'So much trust in such a short time,' he thought, half in wonder and half in reprimand.

Taking the novel from her, he began to read, soaking up her trust as if she'd passed him a flare to keep tucked, burning brightly, inside his heart.

Today was definitely a day of firsts. He mused over how she had stolen his lap in the morning, the chaos with Leviathan trapped beneath her, Lucifer’s soggy form, and now he was in her bed.

Stealing space in her bed was something that seemed to come naturally to his brothers and not himself, barring Asmodeus who refused to wear clothing to bed, and yet here he was, reading to her while she curled around him nearly as tightly as she had Leviathan’s tail.

Humans must need a great deal of comfort given how readily she falls asleep once one of them is available to warm her. He considered how she used Belphegor and Mammon as hot water bottles. 'What does she do when we're not here?'

“You’re really pretty, Satan,” she said, slurring the words sleepily, her eyes still closed.

It was his turn to be red faced today it seemed. He peered down at her, but she was asleep.

Picking up his own discarded novel, he decided not to move her when she had only just fallen off.

Only a couple pages into his reading, and small fingers intruded across his stomach. He looked down again, to see her hand finding purchase just under his shirt. It reminded him too much of the unfortunate body swap incident, when he had slept against her, but while in Lucifer's body. Her hands had roamed much more then, not that he had stopped her right away. The way she recoiled that morning and pushed herself out of the bed and onto the floor had amused him for days.

He waited to see if she would “molest” him, as she had called it, but her hand only dipped enough to find a hold on his hip bone, barely below his belt, before she settled. ‘Little heat vampire,’ he thought.

It was a few moments before he realized that she wasn’t stealing his heat. If anything, she was giving it off and exceptionally so.

Slowly, he tilted his head to rest his cheek against her forehead. 'Very warm,’ he thought; but from what he’d read, humans did sometimes grow sick from exhaustion, including low fevers. Her breathing seemed fine to him, but he was concerned upon noticing the rapid pulse he found. He read a bit longer, expecting a bad dream to rear its ugly head based on her heart rate, but she didn’t stir, only dropped deeper into sleep, until finally both her respiration and heart rate slowed.

Closing up his book, he took his time to consider her rapid change in health. She had been here only a short time. Even shorter when looked at it in the grand scheme of their long life-times, and yet she had managed to wrap most of them around her little finger. _ All of them _ , if Lucifer had actually washed her hair, and not eaten her heart as a spotless sacrifice afterward.

Perhaps Diavolo had something else in mind when he invited the Terra Firma students, something other than “understanding.” Was the mayfly lifespan of humans the key to this type of rapid change? Certainly not in Solomon's case.

Maybe it was her own adaptability. He couldn’t imagine many other humans adapting so rapidly or easily, even with regular rest. ‘Is it because she’s a child of Lilith? Or is she just naturally an agent of change?’

He was stirred from his thoughts when Mammon quietly opened the door.

Carefully, Satan shifted out from under her, setting her book down beside the occupied pitcher.

He gave Mammon a silent nod as he left, a changing of the guard.


	21. All's Fair

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beelzebub confronts Belphegor.
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please expect some sexual interaction between the "twins" in this chapter. 
> 
> If you are not comfortable reading this, I recommend you skip down to the author's notes at the end for the outcome.
> 
> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

Beelzebub was clearing away his dishes, preparing to leave that kitchen when he paused to watch with interest as Mammon collected something from the top of the cabinetry. ‘I’ll have to check there from now on as well,’ he thought ruefully. There was always a new place to scavenge or search that he needed to remember.

He was almost back to his room when he felt the other half of him shift again with a great deal of intensity. It was always a difficult balancing act to maintain his own enthusiasm when he could feel Belphegor’s apathy or anger.

While he was eating, he could feel the displeasure rolling off Belphegor, souring his own meal, but as his hand reached for the door to their shared room it evaporated into what could only be described as gloating. If Beelzebub’s wings had still been out they would have fluttered in irritation.

With Mammon in the room with them nothing would happen, he reminded himself. Mammon's protectiveness was nearly enough to rival Leviathan’s jealousy after all. ‘It’s likely just Belphie taunting Mammon.’

Beelzebub laid out his clothing for the following day, and changed into a clean pair of shorts. Looking at his bedside table he considered investigating the red scrap of fabric he’d found in his parka earlier. No, Belphie would be back soon; he’d tire of baiting Mammon soon enough, and Beelzebub didn’t want to share his secret prize. He climbed into bed instead, intent on passing the time, until his next snack, peacefully.

Opening his D.D.D. to Devilgram, he scrolled while his mind wandered. He wanted to see her again. If he was lucky maybe they would pick up where they left off. However, he had been told she needed rest; maybe he should let her recuperate after so many visitors to keep her awake. Not that he needed the excuse, but he did have the key to return to her still. At worst, he’d get to see her an extra time tomorrow for that reason alone.

A wave of yearning washed over him. Would she still want to see him after he’d left her in that state, to receive guests no less? The memory of the way he’d been allowed to touch her made his chest tight. He felt vulnerable when he thought of her like that, but also very aroused. Palming himself, he lay back, thinking of her and remembering the way she sounded when she was flush against him. How she had rocked and arched over him, and her words of need had almost undone him despite still being fully dressed.

His horns struck the headboard when he tossed his head back, unaware until then that he’d transformed once more. He didn’t care. He just moved his hand faster, pressing against his thigh with the other hand, aiming for the slightest mimic of the way her legs felt around him. He tried to remember the sensation of her kiss and the taste of her tongue as he came in his hand.

Laying there for a time, with his eyes closed, Beelzebub enjoyed the afterglow while he imagined what she would look like in the red bra and their matching bottoms. His mind was clouded with various places and ways he would take his time to peel them off of her.

This evening was turning out to be warmer than he’d expected and he sat up to take off his sweaty and soiled shorts. 'Fuck. She has me so wound up.' He still felt the need to touch himself. ‘Except...That isn’t  _ my _ need,’ he thought, storming out of the bedroom to find its true owner.

* * *

Belphegor passed Asmodeus and Satan in the doorway and was ready to make for the common room when he was unceremoniously picked up and slung over Beelzebub’s shoulder.

“What was  _ that _ ?” Beelzebub asked, once he had carried Belphegor back to their room and kicked the door shut. He tossed Belphegor onto his own bed to keep from rattling his twin like a giant Shake Weight. 

“Just a kiss,” Belphegor said, his eyes glittering with triumph and something dark and gloating, “...and a promise.”

Beelzebub was trying not to let his trembling hands show as he paced. “Then what was that  _ earlier _ ?”

“Oh, that? I was busy licking watermelon juice off of her body.”

Beelzebub picked him up by his shoulders, crashing him against the wall, but he couldn’t find any sensation of a lie. Was it really true? Resting his head against the wall next to Belphegor, he let him dangle there, seemingly unperturbed by the position.

“We shouldn't be bothering her with our petty competition while she's sick,” Beelzebub said instead of throttling him. “It’s practically taking advantage of her.”

“Well, she seemed to know exactly what she wanted,” he said, and Beelzebub could feel the after effect of Belphegor’s memories rolling through him: a strong current of pleasure and domination.

He tried to catch his breath. Tame his temper. Salve his heart. 

“It felt like you weren’t having a bad time either,” Belphegor said, his words dripping with derision. He knew exactly how to get under Beelzebub’s skin.

Beelzebub bit into his tongue to keep from doing anything. He wasn’t even sure what he wanted to do.

“Don’t worry Beel, she’s fine,” Belphegor said, dropping his voice low to lean down and whisper in his twin’s ear despite his dangling body between them. “I grabbed her by the throat but didn't choke her, just kissed her so deep she forgot whose air she was breathing.”

Falling to his knees, Beelzebub’s hands slid from Belphegor’s shoulders to his wrists, otherwise letting him free. Why did it have to be like this? Belphie knew what she meant to him. 

* * *

Belphegor looked away: he felt shame, but knew it was his own. Beel was a giant, but his heart was also made of marshmallow. He shouldn’t tease him like this. He hated to see him hurting. ‘But I also can’t lose.’ 

Lowering himself down the wall to hug Beel, Belphegor pretended not to see the tears that had leaked down his cheeks. “I’m sorry, Beel,” he whispered quietly, sincerely. He knew it would be felt.

It was barely a heartbeat worth of time before he felt Beel’s hands tighten around him again, this time on his hips. There was no anger present any longer, only a swell of determination similar to when Beel was excited to lift a new weight level. The sudden change was disorienting.

His arms still around Beel’s neck he had no protection from the mouth that hungrily descended on his collarbone. It roamed over his neck while he was held in place, even as he pushed at Beel’s shoulders. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” he asked. “We’re fighting right now!”

An affirmative hum vibrated through him from Beel’s mouth.

Beel’s hands cupped under his ass, he was lifted easily. Hoisted above an unexpected and prodding erection, Belphegor kept his whole body limp with dead weight and ignored the way his hips were now flush against Beel’s stomach.

This definitely wasn’t the first time they’d worked off frustration together, but they hadn’t since they’d started competing for her affection. “I won’t fold to this, Beel,” he said, trying to build a plan that would salvage this. There had to be some way to turn this around, one that would suit his future interests.

“That’s all right,” Beel said with a hint of amused badinage as he tossed Belphegor onto the nearest bed, and divested him of his shirt.

And  _ that _ threw Belphegor off his game. ‘Beel’s rarely a planner,’ he thought, ‘but it’s clear he has something up his sleeve that I haven’t anticipated.’ He needed to figure it out, and quickly.

Beel’s eager mouth was back on him already, and he was having trouble thinking as large hands returned to hold him down and to expose him further. Only his socks and boxers remained now. “Beel, quit it. I’m not interested!”

“Really?” he asked, the accompanying chuckle breathing hot across Belphegor’s groin. “Then why are you at attention for me?” He dragged his tongue over the fabric slowly, applying pressure to the already damp spot he found.

“You’re just feeling your own lust in me. Nothing more,” Belphegor said, ignoring the sweep of his strong tongue.

Beel paused, nuzzling the exposed stomach before him, dangerously close to the waistband of Belphegor’s shorts. He took his time feeling, with hands and senses, and emotions. “Liar,” he said, and kissed along the line of elastic, accepting the flesh as it jerked up to meet his mouth.

His underwear was gone in an instant, but Belphegor watched with bated breath as Beel slowly, slowly brought his hot mouth down and around his shaft. Moving lower inch by inch, until he finally felt Beel swallow around him, and begin to swirl his tongue. Lost in sensation, he tried to reach out to touch more skin, but his knees were quickly slung over Beel’s shoulders.

Thick hands cupped his ass, encouraging him to thrust.

‘This isn’t how it usually goes,’ Belphegor thought, and yet he couldn’t help but moan as he emptied himself much too quickly into his twin’s mouth. Beel’s tongue still swirled with gentle suction, drinking all of him in and over sensitizing him. Belphegor tapped at the broad shoulders under his thighs, asking for mercy.

His legs and cock dropped simultaneously over the edge of the bed. It was a shock of cold.

Beel wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. His eyes were ignited with a dauntlessness that Belphegor hadn’t seen in centuries.

Rapidly, Beel’s plan dawned on him. ‘I may have a gift for words and manipulating a scenario to meet my purposes, but he’s going to try and siphon away my will to use it.’ It would be much harder to woo her without fervent hands and an ardent passion to conjure up those words. 

Lethargy, if he couldn’t use dreams, was his greatest weakness when it came to chasing her.

'Fuck,' he thought. 'I'm not going to get out of here tonight.'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those skipping this chapter:
> 
> The twins didn't make up, but came to a understanding wherein Beelzebub will keep Belphegor too tired to compete for MC's affections. Belphegor hasn't yet figured out how to counter it.


	22. Dim the Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon and Lucifer keep watch in the night
> 
> Day 42, Saturday, February 11th => Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

Mammon told the glow lanterns to extinguish themselves. Crawling into bed next to his human, he was careful not to touch her other than to run his thumb across her cheekbone. ‘Hurry up and get better,’ he thought. Guilt ate at him, telling him that he hadn't taken good enough care, that he didn't notice the signs of her fatigue soon enough.

Worried he’d woken her when she sighed in her sleep, he paused but she only nuzzled into his palm, reaching out her hands to find him. ‘Seems strong enough!’ he thought as she pulled them closer to one another, meeting him almost half way.

When she snuggled into his chest, he couldn’t keep his hand on her cheek. His arm was still held out awkwardly above her when she inhaled deeply and let out a small happy sound.

He smiled, willing away the blush she induced in him. Of course she was happy in his arms. This was the safest place for her. He settled his hand at her back. 

The moment of happiness didn’t last long. Her breath was so hot against his chest, even through his shirt. Would she be alright by morning, or even the day after that? Maybe tomorrow he’d talk to Simeon or Solomon. They had experience with human illnesses.

Throughout most of the night she fussed, moving and stretching, occasionally grabbing at him in delicate places. He forgave her and remained impassive. Well, as best he could. One particularly low groan she let out, when she slid her leg over his hip, almost did him in. He wasn’t an angel anymore after all, but he was trying his best to act like it tonight.

He didn’t realize how late it was until he heard the door to her room open. It closed and he heard Lucifer’s clipped steps. ‘Room checks must be complete already.’ His best bet was to pretend to be asleep. Lucifer wouldn’t want to risk waking her as well.

Soon enough he nodded off with her wrapped around him, despite his intention to slip away.

* * *

Lucifer was unsurprised to find Mammon in the human’s room. His brothers all thought they were exceptionally stealthy when they stayed the night. Both he and the human pretended he didn’t see them and together they avoided a clash of wills over her demon’s sleeping habits.

At least this way, Lucifer knew that Mammon was in the house  _ and _ out of trouble. ‘Who would’ve guessed that the key to making Mammon behave was a human?’ He should have considered it after the third or fourth child he rescued. ‘As bad as Satan and cats.’

Slipping off his shoes, Lucifer pulled the chair closer to the bed and let his legs rest on the unused side of the mattress.

He didn’t question why the bed was an extra few feet away from the wall now, instead he sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. Diavolo was now aware of her exhaustion and there was nothing more he could do for the night. 

There would be no doctors until it was determined that there was something to be treated other than fatigue. ‘I’m only checking in. Doing rounds anyone would do with an invalid in the home,’ he thought. ‘I’ll return in a few hours after the most pressing paperwork is completed.’

In retrospect, it made sense that it would be more difficult for a young woman, previously unaware of the expanse of her universe, to adjust than someone like Solomon. Truly, it was more surprising that this hadn’t happened in the first weeks of her stay, or even multiple times since then.

Continuing to rest his bones, he took time to congratulate himself on casually letting slip that human educational systems often had a time off in the spring to celebrate the return of light and life. Diavolo took to it immediately and the ever patient Barbatos was already beginning preparations for a party on the 49th day.

Classes were to be cancelled until after that and invitations were already being delivered. ‘Any excuse for a party,’ he thought, annoyed by the hassle that would come with wrangling the other six for the festivities. ‘Enduring and apologizing for my idiot brothers’ terrible manners during the party will be worth it though if it means the human can get proper rest.’ Her recuperation was pivotal to Diavolo’s program succeeding after all. At the very least the academy students and faculty would be pleased by the unexpected break.

Resting his eyes, he listened to the human’s fitful sleep and Mammon’s fake snores. He would allow himself just a moment longer here before he returned to his study. Paperwork was ever present and it waited for no demon. He was only resting his eyes.

Soon, only the little water demon remained awake to keep vigil.

* * *

Mammon woke first. He looked at his surroundings and decided to make a break for it. ‘No point in getting a lecture first thing!’ he thought, ‘But, first…’ He checked on the human next to him.

It had been an endeavour, but he had managed to remove himself from her clutches last night. Usually she was cold but last night he hadn’t wanted to add his heat to her fever; with the glow lights in the tree canopy above beginning to flicker to life, signalling the start of the day, he knew he was out of time, but he couldn’t help reaching out to hold her hand one more time.

He was no good at showing it when she was awake, but he could at least treasure these quiet moments when she didn’t know about them. Leaning down, he kissed the top of her head, and prepared to carefully slide out from under the covers.

It was her happy sigh that pinned him to the mattress and he was caught again when she reached for him. Her grip was much stronger than he remembered. Then again, it wasn’t often that he was trying to get out of her grasp. ‘Maybe she’s regaining some of her strength?’

He wanted to rub his nose back and forth over hers and let her know how much he loved her attention, that he cherished the way she trusted him in her sleep. Instead, he slipped away quietly, knowing Lucifer would wake soon.


	23. New Background

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC wakes up, still feeling unwell.
> 
> Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

She ached with want. The even breathing at her neck, that she had grown accustomed to through the night, had disappeared. That was one downside to sleeping with Asmodeus. Now her body recognized her sleeping companions much more readily as male and fuckable.

The soft mattress was at least a comfort and she rolled over to revel in all of the space she had to herself. Eyes closed, she stretched and enjoyed the fresh smell of her sheets. Or perhaps not. ‘Do my sheets sort of smell like sex?’ she wondered. Clearly, yesterday had melted her brain. Not that she minded. She stretched again, and enjoyed the hazy, soft feeling that enveloped her.

Finally opening her eyes, she was surprised to find Lucifer asleep with his feet on her bed, one ankle crossed over the other.

Very carefully, and quietly, she collected her D.D.D. and sneaked a picture. ‘Hello, new background!’ she thought. ‘I just have to make sure Mammon never sees this or he’ll try and sell it.’ She hid the D.D.D. under her pillow immediately. No evidence.

Sneakiness behind her, she looked at Lucifer more carefully. He seemed much more relaxed. It reminded her of when she found him on the rooftop in  _ ‘Dogi☆Maji☆Memorium!’ _ , less strict. His hair, only slightly disheveled, only served to make him look more charming.

His eyes opened slowly, the red within black growing brighter as he noticed her studying him.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” he said.

She smiled sweetly, unwilling to be goaded into losing her prize. “I didn’t realize you would stay the night,” she said, realizing she didn't know when he'd arrived. “Thanks for watching over me.”

Moving to put on his shoes, he gave her a curt nod, and slid his forbidding mask back into place.

“I know I have a clothing required stipulation for my bed, Lucifer, but you didn’t need to stay in your full suit.”

He looked down at his wrinkled suit, and glanced back at her as if he pitied her. The tiny hint of amusement that danced at the corner of his lips told her she’d complained about a crumpled tissue as if there weren’t hundreds more tissues in the box.

“When was the last time you had a break?” she asked, ignoring the patronizing look.

She loved the dark rumble of his “ _ Hmm _ ”, as he thought, comforting, yet wicked.

“Where even Diavolo wouldn’t call on you,” she said.

“Leviathan’s video game then,” he said. “There has never been a time when I have been unavailable otherwise.”

She laughed at the memory. “I’m sorry,” she said to his rising eyebrow. “I was just remembering how  _ laaaazy _ you were with your seduction.”

“And yet, I was still in the running,” he said, eyeing her in a way that he knew would make her stomach jump.

“Well, it was nice to see you relax,” she said, redirecting to slightly safer territory with only the tiniest of pauses. “It made you more handsome.”

“You think I’m handsome,” he said.

She could see he was stifling the need to preen. “You know you are,” she said with a coy smile, “but just because a peacock is beautiful, doesn’t mean it isn’t even more brilliant under a different light.” She could see his smugness, just under the surface. ‘Oh vanity, what would I do without you,’ she thought.

“Flattery will get you nowhere,” he said.

“It’s only flattery if it isn’t true,” she said, her mind constantly searching for a counter, or rebuttal when he was near. ‘Perhaps he will take the hint and take this week off.’

He only laughed at her. “Remind me why we don’t have a pact?”

“Because I have nothing you want,” she said, with a genuinely annoyed huff.

He considered her. He could make her his. He would enjoy having something, someone his brothers continued to vie for in their own ways.

More enjoyment than he had had in hundreds of years, perhaps since he had arrived here in Devildom, had been because of her; she’d brought at least as much enjoyment as vexation.

“Nothing besides your shiny soul, anyway,” he said finally. “Now, I should let you know about the plans Diavolo has put in motion.”

“Two weeks off. Party on Saturday?” she asked.

He nodded. "Party on the  _ forty-ninth day _ . No classes until the fifty-eighth," he said correcting her use of the human calendar.

“Beel invited me to practice dancing,” she said by way of explanation. “Which may have been a subtle hint that I stepped on some toes last time.”

“You managed just fine in my tight embrace,” he said, wincing at the memory of his warning to her during one of their first dances together. He was sure he had bruised her hand. “I have overstayed,’ he said abruptly, and stood to leave.

“If you need an extra tutor come find me,” he said tiredly and patted her head. “A tray will be sent up with breakfast. Please rest in your room until tomorrow, or I  _ will _ call the doctor.”

She just looked at him sympathetically.

There was a crack in his mask, and she saw his unsettled response to her compassion, but the façade was firmly back in place as he closed the door.

Sighing, she recollected her D.D.D. and debated sharing the photo with Diavolo.

‘No, this will be just mine,’ she thought, only remembering her need to message Solomon as she set and saved her new background photo.

‘Solomon must have come up against similar dilemmas before in his long life of demon mastery,’ she thought. It was harder to type out than she’d expected, her concentration regularly broken by the phantom of Lucifer's head pat tingling over her scalp.


	24. Conversations with Solomon the Wise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC shoots Solomon a message asking for advice.
> 
> Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

**Gotta Catch 'Em All Chat (2):**

**Day 43, Sunday, February 12th**

**07:00**

**MC:** Hey

**MC:** How often do you sleep with Asmodeus?

**SongOfSolomon:** I was not expecting that question. Usually you just ask about history.

**SongOfSolomon:** Why?

**MC:** Just answer the question, Solomon.

**MC:**

**SongOfSolomon:** As often as I can.

**SongOfSolomon:** Why?

**MC:** Debating whether it’s a good idea.

**SongOfSolomon:** A dalliance never hurt anyone.

**MC:** Says the man who has had 700 wives.

**SongOfSolomon:** That may have been a bit of an exaggeration over the years.

**MC:** Helpful.

**SongOfSolomon:** Are you saying you need a hand?

**MC:** I’ll be fine, thank you.

**SongOfSolomon:** I am only a short walk away.

**MC:** I am quite capable on my own, thank you very much.

**SongOfSolomon:** Ah, well, you do have plenty of options nearby.

**MC:** ??? I would hardly say Asmo counts as “plenty”

**SongOfSolomon:** You obviously don’t know Asmodeus then.

**SongOfSolomon:** But no, I was referring to your other summons.

**MC:**

**SongOfSolomon:** What? It’s not like you’d be commanding them. I mean unless you’re all into that.

**MC:** All? Where is your brain going? You’re an old man, Solomon!

**SongOfSolomon:** An old man with experience.

**SongOfSolomon:**

**MC:**

**MC:** Stop that.

**MC:** Would seem quite pointless other than a quick tumble, given that they’d outlive me by like 100x.

**SongOfSolomon:**

**SongOfSolomon:**

**SongOfSolomon:** You just said I’m an old man.

**SongOfSolomon:**

**MC:** You’re an all powerful sorcerer, Solomon. You’re the exception to the rule.

**SongOfSolomon:** Says the woman who has never asked.

**MC:** … Is that a thing?

**SongOfSolomon:** What, you think Noah lived to be 950 because of good genes?

**MC:** It wasn’t covered in class! How would I begin to guess at that?

**SongOfSolomon:** Either way, it’s worth the ride if you have a pact worth trusting. I don’t recommend it with anyone who would devour your soul while you’re incapacitated.

**SongOfSolomon:** I do fully recommend Asmo, though. He’s worth being devoured for.

**SongOfSolomon:**

**MC:** Solomon!

**SongOfSolomon:**

* * *

**13:00**

**MC:** Solomon, please teach Simeon how to turn off his capslocks. He won't stop and Luke isn't answering.


	25. Time to Think

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally, a few moments to herself, MC reflects on Solomon's words.
> 
> Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

She stared at Solomon’s responses and felt a weight lift from her that she hadn’t realized she’d been carrying. ‘I don’t have to blink out like nothing,’ she thought. The idea of her demons reverting to the way they were before they’d all met would break her ghost-heart. Lucifer's shell, especially, would re-harden.

It was clear to her that when they’d fallen they didn’t share their grief with one another and heal. They’d forced it inward: eating, rutting, taking shelter behind high walls, apathy; it was like they had let their new demonic skin grow over their bandages.

She saw them when they were outside the House of Lamentation. They may put their wings and tails away for her at home, but their minds didn't shift so readily away from shielding themselves. Everything looks like a nail when you’re a hammer, and it was obvious, with their claws always at the ready, that they still perceived threats. 

Shivering, she remembered the sounds coming from the alley around the corner as Mammon "dealt with" her momentary captor. That part of them was still there when they came home each night, just hidden away.

‘I doubt I can peel all the dressings away, but I would like to see further beneath the Avatar titles,’ she thought. ‘Will there be more of their angelic natures? Will they be more human? Or will I just find more despair?’

They were still in there, she was sure, just hiding inside their cocoons. Satan might be the only exception, thrust into the middle of insanity, forced to survive and find himself in a storm not of his own making; there was nothing for him to go back to or fall back on. He'd made himself out of what he had, and scrabbled for every scrap he could make available to himself.

‘Can I love people so deeply damaged?’ she wondered. She had at least an inkling of interest in each of them. Well, more than a little. ‘Can I let myself love them differently? More fully than now?’

Choosing to love someone who is damaged, you take on the weight of their past, their pain, their guilt in a hundred little ways. She wasn’t sure she was strong enough, or patient enough. ‘Haven’t I already been through all sorts of their drama already though?’ She had helped to staunch the bleeding. If she stayed longer, she could help it to scar over, but they would always be a little broken.

Was that something she wanted? To accept the dents and cracks? Would they trust her enough not to break her when she showed them her wants? Did  _ she _ trust them enough to explore and expose those wants with them?

She let out her breath in a long steady ‘ _ Whoosh. _ ’ Would any of them want her longer than until their curiosity was gratified?

But, no matter what, there was the ever present dilemma: even if she did choose to, and they did too, picking even one would upset the delicate balance in the household.

Oh, she could play with Asmodeus on occasion without any real repercussions, unless losing her heart to a narcissist was a repercussion. He really could be doting, and she knew he wouldn’t ask her for more than she was willing to give, not beyond gentle suggestions anyway. 'He knows me almost as well as Leviathan,' she thought. There were so many late night talks and chaste affections that she would never reveal to another creature.

‘I’m already worried about how Mammon will react if he sees these hickeys,’ she thought, bringing her palms up to scrub at her face. 'I can't live in turtlenecks forever.' Mammon would be upset no matter who she chose; even choosing to be with him would cause turmoil. He would be erratic at best, gloating and possessive at worst. Adorable, but a whirlwind of unruliness no matter what.

Leviathan, other than if they played virtual eroge games together would be untenable for her in the long run. Even if he _ did _ have a nose bleed near her on occasion, currently it would be very difficult. He knew her so well, and she would enjoy his discomfort - and rocking his world if he would let her, but his envy would be out of control if she indulged with anyone else, or left the house for too long. ‘The admiral's uniform might be hot though.’

Satan was likely off the list too. His knowledge was sexy, and his love of kittens was very endearing, but he didn’t strive for her attention the way the others did. If she didn’t pursue him he likely wouldn’t see it as a loss. ‘Although, that little prickle of power that goes up my spine when he snaps at someone while I’m in his lap is interesting.' There was something there, just under the surface between them that she couldn’t name. It was restrained and careful, and very dangerous. She strummed her fingers over her stomach. ‘Daddy issues,’ she thought, putting an end to that line of questioning.

‘Biggest daddy issues of all: Lucifer.’ He’d twisted her thoughts since her first night here. His voice was sin itself, but she didn’t have a pact, a safety net to call on. 'His care is evident, and there might be a pinch of lust there, but too dangerous by half,’ she thought. He was likely only toying with her. If she’d been any other mortal, he likely would’ve tortured her with her on-and-off infatuation just to pass the time.

That left the twins. She tented her fingers together over her diaphragm, flexing them. They had both certainly made their interests readily known in the last twenty-four hours, but choosing either of them would wound the other. Beelzebub was painfully sweet, but she’d seen what he’d done to her wall over a small cup of custard. Either of them could collapse the building with a tantrum. They seemed so much younger than their actual years. If they were human, she’d barely put them as out of their teens: fickle, reckless, quick to aggression, every insurance company’s worst nightmare.

She forgot to breathe. 'I'm an idiot," she thought and rolled over to stuff her face into her pillow. 'Beel wouldn’t talk about their fight because it was about me.' She didn’t want to be egotistical, but she didn’t want to be blind either. Other than her, Belphegor, and food, Beelzebub didn’t show interest in protecting, or fighting about,  _ anything _ . So, unless Belphegor suddenly felt the urge to attack Beelzebub for a comfort candy lollipop, then that only left her.

‘How can two beings created simultaneously have nothing in common except that they don’t like to share?’ she wondered more than a bit peevishly. She sighed loudly, and craned her neck back to look up at her tree and its many lights. ‘Is it so wrong that I want to love and touch all of them?’

She sat herself up. There was no point in sulking about it; everything was exactly the same as it was yesterday, and the day before. ‘I can’t find a way to avoid hurt feelings.’ That was certain. ‘I could have continued letting this teeter on the edge of propriety until my time at R.A.D. came to an end, but Beelzebub and Belphegor are forcing my hand.’ It would be impossible not to give them an answer for the remainder of her stay. 

The trade offs were all terrible: hurt one and it would only wound the other; reject both and the pain would amplify; accept one and the pain would only be more noticeable by the contrast of their twin’s happiness; accept both and they would likely still feel betrayed; accept anyone else, even from outside the dorms, and the entire house of cards would collapse.

One of her trinkets tumbled off her dresser and she whipped her pillow in the general direction of the sound. She didn’t understand why Mammon was so afraid of ghosts; they were a nuisance but he’d make a killing if he could figure out how to get them to work for him.

Grumpily, she flopped back down on her bed and grabbed another pillow to ball under her head. She hadn't even considered what would happen to any relationship when she was sent home.

‘I really am between the devil and the deep blue sea,’ she thought. Another one of her pressurized sighs filled the air. The silence after was disturbed only by a gentle knock at her door as Lucifer let himself in with a breakfast tray.

‘He can be so sweet sometimes,’ she thought.


	26. Hypothesis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Satan helps MC test her hypothesis after Levi gives her the idea. Mammon is called in to help.
> 
> Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

She was delighted! Finally, something to make her heart hammer that wasn’t male, or demonic, or both!

The tray of food was normal human food! All of it! No weird tasting pancakes! Bacon and eggs and toast without insects! Nothing gurgled back at her or tried to leave the plate on its own!

She was in her glory and too busy to see Lucifer’s self-satisfied smile when he turned to leave without a word.

Comfort Food ✔

Blessedly, there was nothing else on her mind but that. She even managed to tune out the dull ache and fever that only seemed to have grown worse since she’d woken.

When she’d stuffed herself to the limit, unwilling to waste any of the curated bounty, she decided to try Leviathan again. Hopefully, he’d decided to forgive her already.

* * *

****b357fr13nd5 Chat (2):** **

**MC:** Levi  
 **MC:** You there?

 **MC:** Please let me know that Henry is okay?  
 **MC:** That you’re okay?

* * *

Her messages still indicated they’d been read, but they continued to go unanswered. The little scaly imp from her pitcher of water was missing too.

Setting aside her tray, she was considering changing into a cooler set of pajamas when the door was kicked open.

Leviathan didn’t strike a heroic pose, but he was carrying at least three different consoles in his arms, while his tail held together a stack of light novels and manga.

“I missed you,” she said, and he blushed and dropped his books.

When he set down the consoles, she hopped out of bed to help him collect the pile of reading material. They reached for the same book and she couldn’t help but giggle at the trope. ‘Oh how easy it would be to have him shaking with embarrassment, and need under me,’ she thought. She finished picking up the books without a word as he ran off to collect a screen.

When he returned, she noticed that he was no longer hiding his form. She liked him like this. It seemed much more natural for him. Unfortunately, it made her want to pet his tail.

“I figured you’d want to play,” he said, not quite meeting her eyes as he tried to hand her a controller.

‘Tone it down,’ she thought, feeling practically predatory. Everything had taken on a double meaning for her since Asmodeus had helped her break the seal. “Thanks,” she says with a soft smile, instead of ‘on your knees.’

They played a variety of games throughout the morning, but she fell asleep shortly after he joined her on the bed, controller slipping from her hand. He stayed by her side, likely to reassure himself that she’d wake up again, or maybe he wouldn’t be able to work up the courage to come back if he left.

It was some time after lunch when she woke, judging by the new tray of food next to her, but everything felt fuzzy again. Sleepy-soft, but also needy, like she was missing something important and shouldn't sit still until she found it.

She tried to shake it away, and concentrate on the on screen fight for which Leviathan was on his elbows at the end of her bed, fixated on the level boss.

“Levi?’ she asked, “Have your toes always been webbed?” They were right next to her.

“W-What?” he asked, his question almost a bleat. Turning from the game to look back at her, he tucked his legs under him.

“I’ve just never noticed before,” she said sleepily.

The ‘Game Over’ music blared behind him, and he groaned, sprawling back out. “You lost me the level!”

“Does that mean I can’t touch them?”

“Are you trying to kill me?”

“Levi, I want to check out your cool webbed feet not mount you,” she said. Well, that was a lie, but it was what it was.

“If you keep doing that, you're gonna...you're making me blush!”

“I’m not even touching you yet,” she said, with a laugh, “and you were already blushing!”

His face grew redder. “You can touch them,” he said, dematerializing his tail to flip over and lay flat on his back and look at her ceiling.

It seemed her sick status gained her special privileges.

He shook when she touched both feet, and she decided to only look at one at a time. Drawing her finger down along the grooves, tugging gently at each bit of shiny, bluish webbing, she ignored the fever in her body in favour of investigation.

“Hm, that was a new sensation to me,” he said, relaxing into her touch the way he would when laying in her lap. “Do it one more time.”

“No wonder you’re so much faster than me in the water,” she said, her fake pout obvious. She moved on to the other foot.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” he said seriously, still steadfastly staring at her ceiling. “You know I get lonely when you're not around…”

“Hey, Levi,” she said, but her voice sounded far away to her. She felt heavy. Her breath came too slow and Leviathan’s big toe, between her thumb and finger, was suddenly hidden by the backs of her eyelids. “Go, get Satan.”

She wasn't sure he had left, but eventually the black spots disappeared from her vision, and they were both leaning over her bed.

“Levia-chan, can I come visit you tomorrow instead?” she asked, still trying to shake the fuzziness completely from her sight.

“You’re not supposed to call me that in front of other people!” he said, gurgling with dismay. “I’ll see you tomorrow!” He was already half out the door.

Fuzziness gone, she sat up and clapped her hands together.

Satan watched her sit in silence other than the repetitive clapping that she focused on intensely.

“I have a theory,” she said, “and I need your help.”

His curiosity was clearly piqued, enough at least that it overrode his immediate concern for her sanity.

“Hand me a notebook and pen?” she asked, motioning towards her desk.

Once handed to her, she began scribbling on the last page. “Okay, my theory is written on this back page with notes on symptoms.  **I am invoking our pact: you are not to read it unless I can’t be woken.** ”

She watched him flicker between worry and inquisitiveness.

Tearing out another page, she wrote on it as well, folding it in half to hide its contents.

With the fingers of her free hand against her lips, she stopped to think, trying to play out all the possible outcomes. “ **If I do fall asleep, and I don’t wake after the instructions, call Mammon and tell him to hold me. If I don’t wake up after that, then you can read the notebook,** and we’ll know my hypothesis was wrong.”

“And if you don’t fall asleep?”

Glancing down at the note in her hand, she quickly opened it to scribble an additional line. “Then you definitely do not get to read that.” She could see the thirst for her mystery barely restrained behind his civil smile. It was his eyes that always gave him away.

“I’m going to give this slip of paper to you,” she said, holding it up. “Your only job is to read the question to yourself  _ if _ I fall unconscious. After which, you will speak one of the pre-written answers aloud. Got it?”

He nodded, clearly confused but understanding of the rules.

“Come here, then.”

When he knelt next to her on the bed, she placed half of the paper in his hands, not yet yielding it to him yet. “I’m going to touch you,” she said and released the note as her hand caressed the soft skin of the side of his neck.

* * *

Watching her with interest, it was less than a minute before her eyes slowly dimmed, until her lashes fluttered once more, and then dropped. Her hands had gone limp as well, and Satan guided them back to her sides.

He opened the note.

I know this is weird. Please bear with me.

Could you in the future, love me?

Please ensure your skin is touching mine while you answer this aloud.

A) Yes, I would happily fuck you until you’re hoarse from screaming my name.

OR

B) No, thank you. I am not interested in you in that manner.

_ P.S. Please destroy this note as it will not destroy itself. _

* * *

The fuzziness began to dissipate again, replaced by the heavy heat from before, and she blinked the room back into existence.

A small flame erupted from Satan’s bare hand, and the note was gone with it. His expression told her the outcome.

She tried not to be embarrassed. “Okay, then,” she said, sitting up again, and pressing her fingertips to her brow.

“Secondary test complete, null hypothesis is not looking good," she said ruefully. "Ready for tertiary confirmation?”

He nodded, still not entirely certain what she was testing. Whatever he thought of this lunacy, he was amused; the appraising and appreciative look he was giving her told her so.

Ignoring the way he now smiled knowingly at her, she picked up her D.D.D. and dialed Mammon. There wasn’t anyone else she could call without making a bigger deal of this. ‘I could still be wrong. Two positive results could be luck.’

He didn’t usually pick up on the first few rings, but today he seemed to answer before it had even rung. "Yo’. What’s up? I'm busy here."

"Mammon, could you please come to my room?"

"Need somethin'?"

"Just you," she said and hung up. It was only ten heart beats, quick beats, before he was at her door.

It was hard not to smile when she saw him, because he would always light up when he saw her smile. She was sure he had run.

“It's not like I've been waitin' around for ya or anything...seriously, I wasn't!” Mammon said, blustering as raked his hand through his hair.

She held her hand out to him, and he strolled over like he had all the time in the world.

Only looking away to glance at the now forbidden notebook, Satan quickly moved to the bedside chair to better observe the testing.

Holding her hand, Mammon patted at it before looking over at Satan. “What’re ya starin’ at? Ain’t ya ever seen a sick human before?”

The sensation of being watched was difficult to shake, but she had asked Satan here for this. Did he really enjoy watching her analyze a situation that much. She was hyper aware now of how her eyes flicked across Mammon’s face, taking in his body language, then back to their joined hands.

It didn’t seem to have any effect. She looked over to the notebook. ‘Could I have been wrong?’ She didn’t notice the way her eyes skittered down and to the right, to focused now on force her overheated brain to test the theory to its limit. Her attention flitted back to Satan. He looked delighted.

Usually, he had an easy time reading her, but right now the mystery must be killing him. Oh, she could keep some cards close to her vest, but right now he was staring as if he was watching a light show, with each new data point she found creating a spark for him to see.

“Mammon, would you hold me?” she asked, her tone leaving no question about the vulnerability she felt.

“What are ya, a spoiled brat?” he asked, the question muttered as he tried not to meet anyone’s eyes, and take back his hand.

She loved when his cheeks pinked that way. “Pleaaase?” she asked. She wasn’t above begging to get what she wanted. Begging Mammon hardly counted as begging and she wanted to feel better.

“Fine, fine...I'll help ya out. But don’t go sayin’ Mammon never does anythin’ for ya.”

She scooted over to let him on the bed, and he reclined before holding out his arms to her, rolling his eyes as if this were the most boring and stupid thing in the three realms.

'He would move all the way to the middle of the bed,' she thought ruefully. 'Bedhog.' All the same, she snuggled up to him. He was likely confused when she decided to lay across his chest, rather than their usual cuddle side by side, and without looking, she knew that his cheeks were redder than before.

This wouldn’t work though, Mammon would get antsy soon with Satan observing.

She kicked off her blankets and straddled him, wrapping her arms quickly around his neck before he could understand and escape.

“W-Whaddya think you're doin'? Ya can't go around feelin' me up like this!” he said, obviously louder than he meant to based on the hushed, strangled noise he made afterward.

“No!” she said, fussily. “Let me be a koala.”

“What the fuck is a koala?” she heard him hiss to Satan.

She petted his hair with one of her hands, still holding him tightly to her with the other.

“Knock it off, will ya! Don't start treatin' me like a child...” he mumbled, his volume now much lower, and he tilted his head back to get closer to her hand.

She looked at Satan, and brought the hand carding through Mammon’s hair to his neckline, letting her hand dip down the back of his shirt against warm skin.

There was a hunger that was only growing hotter in the pit of her stomach, heating the rest of her and burning her skin. Only where Mammon’s hand was around her waist did it feel cooler. She focused on breathing. ‘This is an experiment. There are no wrong results,’ she reminded herself, and she doubled down.

Mammon’s bewildered gaze met hers. Her pupils were dilated and searching him. He swallowed thickly while he watched her wet and bite her lower lip.

Shakily, she held out her other hand to Satan, stretching it across the expanse of the bed. She was sure he would have to crawl to reach her, but she wasn’t disappointed. Just the tips of his fingers met hers and she shook. The rapid breaths that left her were laced with the beginnings of a whimper.

Removing her hands from them as fast as she could, she held them tightly against her chest, safe from additional contact. “Help me get off, please?” she asked with her eyes closed, trying to calm herself.

In retrospect, she should have expected the mischievous laughter from Satan. Her choice of wording was not ideal. Thankfully, Mammon carefully lifted her away to the edge of the bed.

Hastening to the end of the mattress furthest from them, she gripped the wooden frame in one hand, and braced the other against the cool stone of the wall. One of the loops of wood creaked under the strain.

Satan moved to take her glass of water, drinking as if he hadn’t had water in days.

“Okay,” she said cheerfully, standing on wobbly feet.

Mammon was quiet. She needed to act quickly before he began to panic.

Her back to them, her voice was still filled with overly-flowery sweetness. “I’m going to kill Asmodeus,” she said. “I’m going to crush his pretty little skull between my thighs!”

She heard Satan spit his water before she heard Mammon choking on air. When she turned to face them and they were breathing properly again, they looked apprehensively at her and the way she gently tapped her palms together.

Snatching up her D.D.D. from the bed, she checked Devilgram to see if Asmodeus was out of the house. He couldn’t not take selfies. “Don’t even think about it, Satan,” she said, her threat practically growled as she saw him eye the notebook.

Mammon knew a thing or two about coveting and items of value, and she should have known that Satan’s fleeting look would’ve been enough to convey that the notebook was worth its weight in gold. It was in Mammon’s hands in milliseconds.

“GAH, no that’s worse!” she said, shouting. “Satan take that away from him!”

“ _ Tsk tsk _ . Foolish woman.” She hadn’t used the pact to actually command him. “Mmm, I’m sorry, but I definitely can’t stop Mammon from reading the last page of that notebook.”

“Satan!” she said, his name barely comprehensible the way she squawked it in outrage.

The shocked betrayal on her face must’ve been priceless to him. He stifled his laughter behind his hand, seeing that Mammon had already found a way to wedge himself between the corner of the walls and the ceiling where she couldn't reach him.

‘His damn long legs!’ she thought as she jumped, trying to grab the book from him. She watched his eyes go impossibly wide and starry and knew that she had lost.

Finally, one of her attempts brought her high enough, her adrenaline allowing her to jump just within reach to snatch the notebook away. She hucked it at Satan who caught it with ease. “You might as well read it then. He’ll never be able to keep quiet,” she said darkly, turning back to her D.D.D.

A slight cough drew her attention away from the screen. “Fine,” she said with a mixture of frustration and embarrassment. “Satan, I rescind my previous order not to read from my notebook.”

“Now,” she said, turning back to the door. She grabbed Mammon by the wingtip before he could beat her to the threshold. “You two will vacate my room, and I will tear Asmodeus limb from limb for leaving me like this for an entire day, and a half, and a night.” They didn’t correct her fuzzy math.

Mammon was not interested in listening. The only probable reason he didn’t pull away was because she was already weak and even a small tug might injure her. She could hear the words before he ever said them: if anyone was gonna kick Asmodeus’ ass it was gonna be him!

“ **I command you both not to beat Asmodeus for this. I explicitly want that revenge for myself. Are we clear?** ” she asked, this time with authority.

They both chimed yes, but Satan’s smirk let her know of her second double entendre.

“Out!” she said as she dialed, then paced to the repetitive ringtone.

“Why hello, my Sweet Mistress, to what do I owe the pleasure of your call?” Asmodeus asked, his words soft, and low-pitched, unmistakably steeped in impropriety.

“If you’re not home, then come home,” she said, her words guarded, but not terse. There was a lull on the other end of the line. “Asmodeus?”

“I’m still here. Just putting on clothing. I know how you like that,” he said, his voice lighter now, with his usual melodic pitch and intonation.

“Are you home or are you out?”

“Does it matter?”

“Come to my room.”

There was a pause again. “Why not come to my room?” he asked, still interested, but a clear hint of his misgivings now present.

“Asmo, I think you fucked me up,” she said, trying to keep the sound of her angry tears from travelling between their D.D.D.s. “Come home and fix me.”

He sighed into the receiver. “I’ll be right over.”

She tried to remind herself not to throttle him until he’d given her the solution, but she mostly just wanted to lay down and cry again.

Moving briskly to the bathroom, she plugged the bathtub and turned the faucet to its coldest setting. 'Strong women don't play the victim. Don't make themselves look pitiful, and don't point fingers,' she thought, admonishing herself. 'They stand and they deal.'

She didn’t have time for finger pointing, guilty parties, or pity parties right now. She didn't before and she didn't now. The only thing of importance right now was solving this before she roasted herself alive in her own body. ‘I can murder Asmodeus later!’


	27. Just a Hint of Relief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally, we figure out what the hell is going on.
> 
> Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you who aren't a fan of smut, please skip to the author's notes at the end.
> 
> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

She waited, and waited, and seethed.

It wasn’t even always anger that she felt, sometimes it was just the heat of the fever that was trying to burn her alive. It was getting hard to tell the difference.

Supper had passed uneventfully: Satan had brought up a dinner tray for her and taken it away untouched, and a ‘No Company Allowed’ sign on her door, courtesy of Mammon, kept additional intrusions at bay. ‘Honestly, it wouldn’t surprise me if Mammon is sitting out there enforcing his sign’s order,’ she thought through the haze.

She pulled out cooler bed clothes for later, something less fluffy, and sunk her feet into the icy cold bath The water was distracting, but didn’t help. ‘I should feel pain from the cold by now,’ she thought, as she tried to crush her anxiety. Neither effort had an effect on the fever fog; the cold water felt luke warm and her apprehension swirled through her, enmeshing itself with the heat.

The sound of her doorknob turning brought her some relief. She'd left it unlocked, hoping to speed Asmodeus’ arrival.

“Heeey! I know you're happy to see me, right?” Asmodeus called from her bedroom.

She said a little prayer of thanks to anything that was listening, but remained perched on the edge of the tub.

When he entered the bathroom, her back was to him while she sloshed water up to her knees. She looked behind her to see him taking in her hunched posture. 

“My Sweet Girl, tell Asmo all about it,” he said, moving his hands to lay on her shoulders.

Avoiding his grasp, she dropped bodily into the tub without a word. She didn’t make a sound when the icy water washed over her, fluffy pajamas and all. “Not that you don’t have a placating touch, Asmo,” she said, fatigued and face flushed from strain, “but right now, I would like to keep my skin from burning off, so let’s keep that to a minimum.”

All hints of sweetness fled his face, and a deadly seriousness replaced it. “ **Explain** ,” he said, and she wasn’t sure if it was the denial of touch, or something else, that put the edge in his voice.

“Well…here goes,” she said, wanting to sink under the water’s surface instead. “I’ve been trying to figure it out and it seems that I’m still exceptionally turned on.”

His leer was short-lived but noticeable. “That’s not exactly an emergency, Darling.”

“And I haven't been able to get rid of this scorching fever ever since,” she said. “The only thing that cools it is someone else’s touch, but by then when they do touch me I’m practically mindless.”

“Again, I don’t really see the problem…” he said, tapping his lip with a manicured finger.

“And every time I touch someone I consider off limits I fall asleep, within minutes. Less if the contact is prolonged!”

He stopped moving to consider her carefully, “Really...?” he asked. “And did you take my advice yesterday?”

“When would I have even had time for that, Asmo, much less someone on tap?”

Her choice of words had the corners of his mouth twitching upwards but the tightness around his narrowed eyes still said he was angry. “So, you came to a demon, or with one rather,” he said with his signature grin, “and then you didn’t follow the aftercare instructions. Is that what I’m hearing?”

“How was I supposed to know they were instructions, and not a suggestion? You’re always recommending I get laid. Why is this any different from me not getting laid before?”

“Because you were with me, Darling,” he said darkly, “because I told you  _ all  _ that pent up tension and emotion wasn’t good for you. Because I told you that you needed to work it out of your system.”

‘So this is my fault. Of course it is. It’s just that kind of year for me,’ she thought. She refused to look at him. “Well, all right, just drown me then,” she said, and tried to sink lower into the water.

He took her face roughly in his hands, and turned her to him, all business. “Have you come at all?” he asked.

Her pained expression told him everything he needed to know.

Dredging her out of the tub, she shrieked in his ear, but he didn’t care; he was clearly more concerned about the icy water soaking against her skin.

Even as she tried to pull away, he tugged off her pajama top, and pressed her naked chest against his flimsy shirt. He dragged her pants down, and kicked them away with his foot. 

For fuck’s sake she was panting already. If she’d been a lust demon, a surge of it would have been visible when he threw his shirt behind him, removing the barrier between their skin. But the heat she felt was undiminished, even after the icy bath, even where he touched her held barely a hint of coolness.

He might not even have to touch her at this point and could probably talk her into coming within minutes. A whine left her when he walked her back to the wall. ‘Safest with the wet floor,’ she managed to think.

“I love the way you’re shaking,” he said and squeezed her tighter against him. "Arousing you, arouses me so much.” Stroking her cheek, he watched as she pressed into his hand heavily, eyes closed. “I was sure when I left the house last night that you had at least had some additional fun,” he said, before dipping slightly to kiss her neck. “Your cheeks were such a rosy shade of bliss.” His mouth was at her ear, and the hand at her cheek was sliding into her hair. “You should have called me sooner.”

For a moment, she imagined that this was what Asmodeus had sounded like as an angel: Rescue. The slightest relief had her enraptured. He was a mercy. His hands skimmed down her sides, while he left small kisses along her shoulders and chest. She wanted to throw him to the floor, and fuck herself on him, but she couldn’t when every hickey he’d left before was receiving its own apology by mouth.

The heat subsided in his wake, but would build back up again, slower than before with each wave.

She remembered Mammon’s awed expression when she’d given into the fever for the barest moment in his lap: how he hyperventilated under her hands, while her eyes had promised him pleasure; how his arm, around her waist, had tightened the smallest amount when he realized she was only focused on him. ‘Fuck!’ She was almost wetter than when she left Asmodeus’ room yesterday.

“Mmph!” She barely stifled the sound of pain and want as Asmodeus’ grip left imprints on her thighs ‘Should have known better,’ she thought. ‘Asmodeus doesn’t like quiet lovers. “ _ Not unless we’re trying not to get caught! _ ” he'd said.’

His tongue was on her inner thighs as his hands worked to pull them further apart. She always forgot how strong those delicate hands were, not that he needed it now. She would spread like butter for him if he could just quench this intense want.

At the barest sensation of his teeth, her hands went to his hair. Already a half lit firework when he took off her clothes, it was both terrible, and a blessing to be almost ready to burst. ‘The heat of his breath must actually be fire,’ she thought, it did nothing to cool her like his touch did.

“You’re behaving  _ so _ well for me,” Asmodeus said, as he left another bite, further up her thigh, closer to where she needed him, “and I do so love giving good girls what they  _ deserve _ .”

She felt his fingertip gliding along the length of her lips, softly back and forth until she whimpered for him, quaking under just that.

His tongue licked over her clitoris. Shaking, her legs abandoned her. If not for his hands holding her in place, she would have been on the floor with him. A broken moan echoed through her bathroom, and her entire body tensed as the dam broke.

Little aftershocks lit up through her, and even as she came down, she still wanted more.

Breathing hard, she looked down at him, waiting on his verdict.

“Will you take my directions next time?” he asked

She nodded enthusiastically.

He smiled at her easy agreement to “next time”.

All she wanted was to do as her body demanded, and slide down the wall to crawl into Asmodeus’ embrace. ‘Next time is tomorrow me’s problem,’ she told herself. ‘I couldn’t care less right now.’ 

“Good,” he said, punctuating each word with a new sensation.

> He kissed her hip bone.

“Because”

> He licked just below her navel.

“It”

> Pulling her away from the wall, he rested her weight on his shoulders and arms.

“Can”

> Coaxing her to curve over him with a lick of his lips, he sucked a nipple into his mouth instead of kissing her, relishing her gasp and doing it again.

“Be”

> A new hickey was lovingly made on the underside of the other breast

“Very”

> His nails sank into the backs of her thighs

“Dangerous,” he said, lowering her in his arms.  “And I don’t want you burning up,” he said, with her nearly folded in half between him and the wall. “I can be quite greedy for you too, you know.”

“I promise,” she said breathily, finally able to feel some of the coolness of the tile against her back.

She was so proud when she didn’t moan while he helped her stand. This was everything, right now. There was nothing else. Only the safety and relief as he wrapped his arms around her.

“I’m afraid this won’t be enough to fix you up, my Dearest,” he said with regret. “I expected you to get off within an hour or two, not more than a day later.” He measured the heat of her body with his own, pressing his forehead to hers and found it warming again already. 

“What do you mean?” she asked, her words a whimper at his shoulder.

“Think of it as accruing interest,” he said. “Compound interest. Hourly. And you had quite a bit of pent up lust to start with.” He stroked her back gently. “... Very interesting that you have a shut off valve for some of my brothers though.” His hand came up to stroke her damp hair as he considered the oddities. “And I've never had anyone react so strongly either...Unfortunately, I can’t stay.” 

She tried to burrow closer to him. 

“Unless you command me to stay,” he said quietly.

Her hold on him tightened, but there was too much feeling, too many emotions in her throat to make adequate words, or force any words out at all.

“Get yourself off a few times before I come home again,” he ordered her, finger pointed at her as he drew away. “You can either come to my room later, or I will come to yours if you still need help.”

“Why wouldn’t I still need help?” she asked, hating the pitiful sound of her voice.

This time his laughter was full, melodious. It filled the room, and helped relax her.

“My sweet, sweet Mistress, if you so much as cocked your hip, or crooked your finger, in this house, I assure you, your bed would be warmed, even without me in it.”

She wanted to believe him. For so long she’d tried not to think about it, to ignore it for the overall peace they had; it was difficult to train herself out of that practiced ignorance, even with ample proof these last few hours.

“Now, now,” he said, shushing her embarrassed expression with a gentle kiss. “It’ll be fine.”

His lips were luscious and soft. Somehow the perfect pressure. She closed her eyes despite the sinless nature of the kiss, trying to enjoy all of it.

“Why not?" he said, smiling against her mouth, “One for the road.”

He dropped to his knees again, and dipped his tongue into the tightness of her body, only to spread the heat of her juices higher across her clit.

She squealed at the suddenness, but then there were only moans as he brought her to completion quickly again on his mouth.

‘Short, and much too fast,’ she thought, almost mourning it.

Sitting her on the counter top, Asmodeus toweled away the last remnants of her icy bath. He was watching her like a hawk as he dried her legs. “Bottoms,” he said, handing them to her.

He pulled the towel she’d moved for out of her reach, and saw the confusion mix with her ebbing euphoria. “Oh no, you’re going to stay slick and wet. I want you to remember what your job is this evening,” he said, “and if that means that you have to live with sticky thighs, then so be it.”

It was clear she didn’t want to, but a single sassy look from Asmodeus, and she put them on.

“Careful, it’s slippery when wet,” he said, amused by his reference to the floor while he helped her down from the counter. “I’ll let Lucifer know not to let anyone in unless you call for them, okay?”

A soft kiss found its way to her temple when she nodded her agreement. She heard him tell her she was a good girl, but when she opened her eyes he was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Asmodeus comes home and aids MC a little bit, but not enough. There had been a clear miscommunication suggestion =/= instruction. MC must get herself off until the magic is out of her system but Asmo is quite perplexed as to how she managed to convert his energy and with such intensity. Asmo leaves to ensure no one bothers her unless she specifically calls for them.
> 
> Try not to loose your cool on the next chapter ;)


	28. Stubbornness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Asmodeus is very pretty, not always the most clever, but very pretty.
> 
> Thankfully, Lucifer is suspicious by nature.
> 
> Day 43, Sunday, February 12th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a bit long and smutty. For those of you who aren't a fan of smut, please skip to the author's notes at the end.
> 
> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for reviewing these updated early chapters <3

It was nice to be able to think again, to be able to breath without the fuzziness at the edges of her senses. Taking a moment, she let herself feel the cold, wet floor under her feet before pulling on her pajama top and stumbling back into her room.

The defeat that cloaked the lines of her body were obvious as she shuffled toward her bed, leaving footprints behind her.

“Why are you tracking water everywhere?” said a deep voice much too close to for comfort.

Watching her spin faster than he’d thought possible in her fatigued state, Lucifer now loomed over her, inspecting, trying to find reason for her lack of usual care. “You don't seem as tired as you did yesterday.”

“Uh. No. I’ll...I’ll clean it up tomorrow,” she said, and turned rapidly around again, striding towards the safety of her bed. Even as she knelt to crawl into the bed she could feel him following closely. ‘Fuck.’ She could feel the heat of his hand before it touched her. ‘He’s only trying to help me settle into bed, just like before,’ she thought, ‘but—’

Her unexpected roll to the other side of the bed startled him and he drew his hand back.

“You know, on second thought, I think I’m feeling well enough to go to the library!” she said, trying for cheerful as she made her way along the wall, and toward the door.

Lucifer was in front of her, between her and the door before she even neared the doorknob. “You have books here,” he said, watching her now with something close to suspicion, “and you’re to stay in your room until tomorrow.”

“Right,” she said, taking a step back. “I forgot. I’ll pick something here.” At the best of times Lucifer's nearness was distracting: his stature, the way he smelled, his voice, the way he exuded his pride into the air around him. ‘Why does he need to be so damn close right now?’ she wondered, trying not to panic.  _ That _ did not need to be standing right next to her, or touching her shoulder, no matter his mother hen instincts!

She walked quickly back alongside her bed, and squeezed through the hidden hole between the tree and the wall. Passing the table, she made her way to the coffin bookshelf. ‘Yes, this is good. Distance is good.’

“You’re not interested in any of the books Satan or Leviathan brought you?” he asked, the deep curl of his voice winding its way through her mind, reaching her as if he were already at her side.

Peeking over her shoulder, she made certain he wasn’t next to her before looking back at her task. ‘He’s on the other side of the table. This is fine. This is good.’ Her pointer finger traced the spines of her books. “Uhm, yes. I mean, no. I’ve decided to read their books with them. In their company. It’s more fun to share,” she said.

The sound of his shoes clipping on the floor spurred her into motion, and she snagged a random book off the shelf. ‘Pace yourself,’ she thought. Mammon said to run if she was ever in danger of being eaten, but this was very different. Running would only make him chase her; she could feel that, knew it in her bones. Previous angels or not, they were as much a predator as anything else here in the Devildom.

His pace quickened, and so did hers. The table still between them, they had changed places.

‘Stupid,’ she branded herself when she made eye contact.

“What are you doing?” he asked. 

His interest in her mysterious behaviour reminded her of Satan, but the suspicious set of his eyes was too serious. “Just grabbing a book.”

“Really.”

“Yes.”

He took a step, and she didn’t move.

He took another and she forced herself to remain inert.

A third step, and she turned to walk back to her bed.

She heard his footsteps like the thunder of her heartbeat, but she willed her steps to stay slow and measured.

When the clip of his shoes stopped, she turned around to face him. “C-Can I help you with something?” she asked. ‘Be nonchalant! Play it cool!’

“Yes.”

“With?”

“Why are you acting so erratically?”

“I’m sorry?” Her confused answer came out as a small squeak.

“Yesterday, you cried yourself to sleep. You later fought me in a bath towel, and then, hands on hips, you berated me while standing on your bed. This morning, you were enamoured and giddy over toast, and now you flinch from me,” he said, arms down and wide in what was close, for him, to supplication.

‘Ugh. Even if he is doing his best to help, I don’t want to share this problem with him,’ she thought. ‘I’ll be fine by morning anyway.’ This was the last sort of thing she wanted to confide to him. It was right up there with could you go buy me some pads? ‘I just have to make sure not to touch him and everything will be fine.’ She took a half step back from his outstretched arms. “Sorry, just tired.”

“Perhaps you should rest instead of read then,” he asked, plucking the book from her grasp. “A favourite?”

“Uh, yes,” she said, trying to calculate how quickly she could get back into bed.

“Really,” he asked, “ _ New Guinea Tapeworms & Jewish Grandmothers: Tales of Parasites and People _ is your favourite?” His eyes narrowed further, and his finger tapped against the spine of the book. “Now, I would hate to think you were lying to me,” he said, laying the guilt on thick.

“It’s excellent bedtime reading?”

He tossed the book onto the bed behind her without breaking eye contact.

‘Why does he always have to be so intense?’ she wondered. ‘He’s so much easier to talk with when he’s sleepy.’

“ **Now** ,” he said, his voice dropping low and deadly while he stepped forward and she stepped back, “not a single one of my brothers would enter your room to deliver dinner. I had to order Satan. Why might that be? Even Belphegor and Beelzebub won’t leave their room.”

Her eyes widened, and the dull sinking of guilt filled her stomach. ‘I didn’t know they wouldn’t leave their room over me.’ Did that mean Beelzebub hadn’t had supper?

Defeat softened the tense lines of her body. “There is a very nice sign on the door that Mammon made...” she said, trying to find reasons why they might not visit.

“Something problematic enough that even Asmodeus told me you looked terrible, and not to bother you.”

‘Fucking moron,’ she breathed out the words, before stepping back and to her right, trying to avoid Lucifer as he nearly stepped into her again. He was clearly trying to herd her back to the bed. ‘Maybe I’m the moron,’ she thought when Lucifer countered her pivot with a long, easy stride.

This was doing nothing to cool her symptoms. She just needed him to leave so she could take care of this!

A few more steps, and Lucifer’s frustration got the better of him. His right hand squeezed around the bottom of her ribs, the capture stalled her inertia, and he jerked her back to him, seizing her right hand in his free one. 

Stepping back, he forced her weight forward into him. It was the beginning of a slow march, as he began walking her backwards. The inside of his feet slid gently against her own unarmored insteps. He let his overcoat fall to the floor.

“I didn’t expect to have to give you a dance lesson so soon,” he said with amusement, throwing her off balance mentally. Gentle, and then guilt, an inconsistent rhythm to wear her down.

“I don’t think it is,” she said peevishly. “Your hold is all wrong.” If she had to she would snub him, refuse to look at him, and pull away from him as far as her body would allow.

“Quite right,” she heard, and then felt a sudden shift. His arm slid around her, splaying his hand across her back, thumb between the base of her shoulder blades, and the rest of his hand fanning to lift her torso higher, and closer to him.

“That’s not what I meant,” she said. “I meant let go!”

“Well, that was terribly communicated,” he said, closing their embrace further, so that his thighs brushed past hers as they stepped between one another's legs. “Almost as terribly communicated as your answers to my questions.”

There it was, the guilt. He was layering it now, and it was working if how red her ears felt were anything to go by. Knowing him, he’d back away now, and let it eat at her, but it was manageable, semi-manageable. 'Lucifer has thick clothing and gloved hands. I can manage this.’ The proximity wasn’t ideal, but however this played out, she likely wouldn’t fall dead asleep, or offend him with advances. “I don’t feel like sharing,” she said stubbornly as he led her around the room.

He propelled her up through a lift, and back into his embrace. “No, you felt like lying instead,” he said, but his words were gentle. 

Clear as daylight, he could see the confusion the juxtaposition his gentle accusation caused in her, and she knew that he saw it. “It’s nothing I can’t handle,” she said, her tone adamant.

“So, there  _ is _ a problem in my household, and currently everyone knows about it except for me,” he said, dipping her low to whisper in her ear. “You wound my pride.”

He’d stunned her.

Obviously, he’d expected a reaction, but not for her to draw in on herself like this. “Always the unexpected with you,” he said when she stopped trying to move out of his grasp; it was as though she were wilting in his arms. He sighed, and it disturbed her damp hair. 

Everything stung. She wasn’t sure what to do except keep breathing. Was there even air in her lungs? She felt half asleep and half electrified. His lips had only grazed her ear.

Lifting her into his arms, Lucifer carried her back to her bed, and sat down. He wasn’t tucking her in as she had hoped, holding her in his lap instead.

“What terrible mischief have you all gotten up to?”

“Don’t bother them?” she asked, mumbling into his vest lapel. “Most of them don’t know.”

“ _ Hmmm _ ,” he said but she felt it thrum through him and into her. “Such a martyr.”

She clutched at his clothing, fisting it tightly, “Stop moving!” she ground out, as her breathing became laboured.

This time he did still. “I’m no human doctor, but this isn’t right. What prank had gone so awry that it would do this, and that you would continue to hide from me?”

When she finally peeked up at him, she was under the shadow of his hair. ‘It frames his face so beautifully,’ she thought. ‘Was his hair like this when he was still an angel?’ She kept trying to breath evenly and gather her wits. “Drop me in the bed and leave. I swear to you, I will be fine by tomorrow morning.”

His arms tightened around her, a frown marring his brow. “I will do no such thing.”

“ _ Pleeease? _ ” she asked, her request as plaintive as it was cryptic. “I don’t want to know. Just let me fix this on my own.”

He said nothing, only began searching her for any wound or hex as he had done the night before, beginning by looking over her hands.

“Lucifer! Please! If you don’t leave I’m going to end up in a coma or dead. Go away!”

Setting her on the bed, he stepped away towards the door, watching as she collapsed on top of the covers. “I  _ will not _ leave and you  _ will _ explain.”

“I did something stupid, and I guess I’m not built like a normal human. Now go away, and let this run its course!” She could feel the tears building behind her eyes. It ached everywhere and she clenched her fists. ‘I want Asmodeus to come back,’ she thought.

The click of the door lock, brought her back to the room, and she followed the sound of Lucifer’s light steps returning to her side.

“Which of them knows what is going on?” he asked, trying to be soothing.

“Just let me die then,” she said, dramatically tossing her arms above her.

He rolled his eyes and then waited.”‘This kingdom for even the smallest amount of cooperation!” he hissed to himself Finally, he lost his temper and grabbed one of her biceps in each hand. “What have you done, you stupid girl?” 

The cry she let out was breathy, and beckoning, and suddenly there was an inch of air between her skin and his gloves. Her arms moved up and away from him, forearms sheltering her eyes. “Just go away!”

“Tell me who, or what, has done this and I will incinerate them,” he promised darkly.

“No!” she shouted. He might just strangle her before his vengeance at this rate. “I will kill him myself, once I survive tonight.”

Lucifer cradled his forehead in his hand before pushing his hair back. “I had to get the most stubborn human in all of Terra Firma.” he muttered, biting back a sharper reply and the urge to shake her. His fingers flexed in the air above her for a moment before he took her hand instead. “How can I help?” he asked, his voice once again steady.

She was sure her heartbeat was shaking her entire body with its rhythm, but he didn’t draw back when she released a hiss at the new contact.

“You’re very warm,” he said. “If I can feel it through guivre leather then the source of your problem must be magical.”

“Stop tempting me and go away,” she said, groaning in frustration.

His eyebrows shot into his hairline at the way her demand poured out of her, each word steeped in throaty arousal. “Asmodeus then.” He rested a knee on the bed to better offer his other hand to her. “Come here,” he said, softly.

She pulled her hand from his, ignoring the one outstretched to her, and tried to curl up and roll further away.

“I've asked you nicely plenty of times, Little Girl,” he warned. He waited to see if she would do as she was told. She was uncurling a bit but not fast enough and so he took off his gloves and rolled up his sleeves. Grabbing her ankle he dragged her back to the edge of the bed. Her yelp didn’t deter him.

She swatted at his hand. “Stop touching my skin, you sadist!”

“Ah so it’s your skin,’ he said as he pulled her across his lap. “Well, guilty as charged, but not in this case.” 

The mirth in his words froze her in place. An instant later and she was kicking, and reaching for the bed frame, trying to swim away from him.

There was a loud clap as he brought his hand down on her ass.

With a squeak, and then a moan, she went limp. “Why are you torturing me?” she asked, her head hanging down below his knee.

“Because you won’t tell me what I need to know to help you.”

“Put your gloves back on and go away! That’s how you can help me!” she said, shouting as she began to kick again.

**‘THWACK!’**

Another shriek and a whimper escaped without her approval. She was breathing hard, and he left his hand spread across her cheeks. There was no glove in the way to hinder the heat she radiated, or the dampness he would feel through her thin pajamas.

Her words were whispers that he had to strain to hear. “I swear, if I die, I  _ will _ come back and haunt you.”

**‘THWACK!’**

This time there was only a moan. “Please, stop?” she asked. Her breathing was irregular, and her cheeks were burning with embarrassment.

“Tell me what I need to know to help you.”

“It’s complicated, but I somehow converted regular pent up emotions into the need for sexual release,” she said, muttering the words angrily into his pant leg.

“I see.”

**‘THWACK!’**

An "eep!” left her, and she shuddered before she regained her senses.

“Why?” She shouted her complaint and tried to escape again.

**‘THWACK!’**

“As much as I do enjoy that charming noise, that doesn’t explain the lethargy, and your continued struggling is unacceptable.” Giving her a moment while she endeavoured to even her breathing, he stopped himself from caressing her ass. This was an interrogation after all.

“Asmo thinks I try to shut it off when I…He thinks I try to shut it off.”

**‘THWACK!’**

He felt her ass press back into his palm. “The whole truth, please, dear.”

Her moan was beautiful as it degraded into a whimper. “Well, maybe one gentle stroke will help,” he said as he caressed her backside. “You never seem to do well with direct orders.”

“Ah…Um, I’m not sure. You’re kind of breaking my hypothesis.”

His hand lifted away.

“No wait!” her voice was pitched high. “It shuts off, and I'm forced into sleep when I lust for an inappropriate target…but I keep dropping between sleep and need now.”

He could see that making sense for her not waking while touching Leviathan, and her alertness had come and gone throughout her ‘human-reboot.’

When the slap didn’t return she continued, “I just need to get off… a lot…and I’ll be fine.” She felt boneless and huffed in frustration. ‘Is he pulling his gloves back on?’ she wondered, unable to identify the sound she heard.

Without warning, he pulled her back up to sit on his thigh, and she pressed her lips together, refusing to make a sound about her abused backside.

“You have six demons, sworn to you, one of whom is the Avatar of Lust, but you would rather stubbornly lay here on your own,” he said, trying to make sense of the situation.

“It’s his fault in the first place,” she said, her words muttered sleepily, “and I can’t call anyone else for help; the House of Lamentation would be burned to the ground with jealousy before morning.”

Lucifer’s expression did not seem pleased, but he wasn't arguing the point.

“Just tell Satan to find a potion to put me to sleep until Asmo comes home,” she said, trying not to kick her dangling feet.

“Belphegor wou-”

“No!”

Refusing to look at him, she couldn’t tell what he thought of her outburst.

“I see.”

He watched as she remained balanced on her perch, eyes closed, neither sleeping, nor entirely awake. “How precisely do I ruin your theory?” he asked while he pulled his shirt sleeves back down.

Her voice was soft and weak. “I can’t fully fall asleep, and I can’t feel enough with you. I can’t make up my mind if you want me or not…and I don’t want to know.”

“But skin to skin contact increases the severity of your symptoms?” he asked.

She nodded, and her breathing increased once more.

His arm came back around her, carefully so as not to touch any exposed flesh. “And you don’t want me to touch your skin with mine.”

“Correct,” she said, willing him out the door, even as she rested more closely against him. Her breath unknowingly tickling his neck.

“Well, if you insist on doing this the hard way,” he said as he brushed his gloved hands down her thighs.

Her eyes flew open at the sensation.

“I am nothing if not a generous host.”

She felt Lucifer’s arm at her waist loosen its grip around her to slide higher, caressing her breast through her thin shirt. The hand still on her thigh travelled to her knees, only to slide between the gap there.

“L-Luuficer,” she said, panting and squeezing her eyes shut, “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Let me take care of you,” he said, his tone urging her in a way his words couldn’t fully express. “I can promise not to touch your skin.”

“That might not be enough. I don’t think you understand what your voice does to me.”

He gripped the inside of her thigh and tweaked a nipple in his other hand.

The change in his hold on her had her head resting in the groove of his neck and shoulder. She turned her face away from him as she tried not to moan, missing the licentious smile her admission dragged from him.

Appreciating that she had thrust her breast fully into his hand, Lucifer tugged gently at her nipple, more insistently as a reward, and watched her squirm on his thigh. “Is that so?” he asked, reaching across her, to drag his arm against her breast while he reached for the other.

“Mmmm…Lucifer, why are you so cruel to me?” she asked, her question a high pitched whine.

He cupped her sex, and he made her whine properly, dipping his gloved fingers into the damp fabric of her thin pants.

When he drew his hand away, there was a heavy rumble at her back. It told her he enjoyed her frustrated groans. 

Without further delay, he dipped below her waist band, and she arched towards him immediately. “I’m simply making sure you remain healthy and hale,” he reminded her, his accompanying growl louder, vibrating her, licking at the fire that consumed her.

His hand took the same slow path it had above the fabric, travelling to her knee with far too many stops along the way there and back.

“Lucifer, I am going to tear off your arms, and beat you to death with them if you keep pausing like this,” she said, gasping as he traced the groove of her lips and leg.

His laughter reverberated through her, and he stood, pulling her with him. “Always so impatient,” he said, chiding her. “That will get you into trouble.”

It was a threat, but she didn’t care. All that mattered was the sensation of his leather gloves sliding through her wetness, gently grazing against her clit.

* * *

Without warning, he plunged two fingers into her and with a cry of surprise she twisted closer to his hand.

‘The way her body curves like a bow, then presses back against me, still standing on the tips of her toes...captivating,’ he thought, but soon enough she was flat footed, grinding against the leather clad meat of his thumb, taking everything he offered. He pressed his fingers further into her to align the pad of his thumb with her clitoris, tapping it as he pumped.

When she shook, his grip on her tightened, pressing her against his chest by her breast bone lest she move too far away in her zeal. He could feel her tightening around his fingers, the seams of his glove creating friction against her clitoris and walls, with every swipe and movement.

Scissoring his fingers inside her, he captured her lips with his as she came on his hand. There was no sound as she pressed against him in every way that she could. 

He expected her to collapse as he withdrew from her. Instead he found himself on his back on her bed. 'She shoved me!'

“Torturer!” she said from atop him. “You are the absolute worst!”

He couldn’t argue that. Her lips were on his again.

Pulling at his tie, she tightened the knot as she devoured his mouth.

Just as quickly as he’d been pushed, Lucifer changed their positions, and she shied away from where his hand gripped her shoulder. “Good, you can feel this cut now,” he said, pressing on it. It was a silver lining to her bad behaviour.

Her eyes were still full of lust, even as she glared up at him. “Yes, I can think again for a little while,” she said, her words still angry as she struggled under him. “Which means that  _ you _ can go back to your paperwork, and _ I _ to my  _ own work _ .”

“The academy is out for a fortnight. I have no paperwork remaining,” he said as he dipped his head to capture a fabric covered nipple between his teeth and ignored her curses. The way she arched into his mouth belied her words and he wouldn’t have her lying to either of them anymore.

“Such foul words from a young lady.” He  _ tsked _ at her before dragging his tongue harshly against the wet fabric he had left behind. When her whole body rose to meet him in response, he pressed her hips back into the mattress with his own. “You are a very poorly behaved guest.”

She grabbed the back of his neck, sliding her fingers upward into a fist full of hair to pull his mouth crashing back down onto hers. “And you are a very negligent host,” she ground out next to his lips when she could once again breathe.

“Beg and I’ll let you come again.” He rocked against her and watched her eyes roll back and her eyelashes flutter. When she looked like this under him, she put Helen of the Portrait to shame: all rage and desire.

“There is no let!” she said spitefully as she regained her mind, surging up to nip and suck at his neck. “I will be just -  _ ooh _ \- fine without your  _ help _ .”

He growled his disapproval into her collarbone, bracing his teeth against her skin, before pulling her back to where they had started. He sat on the edge of the bed with her perched upon his lap. She clung to him, this time straddling him, hands shaking and fisted in his clothing but otherwise unmoving. ‘So much restrain in one human,’ he thought. It was admirable, if foolish.

Taking one of her hands from over his shoulder, he held it until the worst of the tension slackened from her arm. He slowly brought her palm to his mouth and kissed it softly. “The greatest coward is the man who awakens a woman with no intention of loving her,” he said. “I may have to wait until later to crucify Asmodeus, but I am no coward.” 

Her breathing had slowed at his words, and the fight in her eyes was dimmed, softer. She ran her fingers through his hair before she leaned in cautiously and kissed him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The greatest coward is the man who awakens a woman’s love with no intention of loving her - Bob Marley
> 
> Lucifer badgered MC into telling him what was wrong until he finally figured it out. They had some very aggressive foreplay until he explained his rationale and she smooched him softly indicating she was okay with how things were going.


	29. Midnight Shift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon tries to check on MC.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

Mammon sneaked out of his room as soon as curfew checks were complete. They were later today than he’d expected and his impatience chafed at him.

Swiftly, he moved down the hall until he reached the door with his sweet flashy sign on it. He ignored the bold lettering that demanded he keep out. After all, he didn’t count as “company.” It was his job to be at her side. He was her first. If there was any time to be at her side then it was now.

No light illuminated the space under the door and he was sure she was asleep. The lights in the tree and over the ceiling beams were silent rather than the usual hum they gave off when she was awake or stirring. Holding his breath, he turned the knob, opening it as quietly as he could.

The wall of carnal fragrance assaulted him before he was ready. He considered turning back, but he closed the door behind him instead. ‘I’m here for a reason,’ he thought. Even if what he saw angered or saddened him, or would only be for a night, he was here to make sure she was alright. It was his job after all. ‘Nothin' to be nervous or guilty about, this is just to check up on her.’ He walked silent towards the bed. 

Her eyes had been wild when she’d slammed the door behind him, and he hadn’t seen her since. All he knew was that first Asmodeus, and then Lucifer, had gone to check on her. He’d locked himself in his room after that: to think and pace. ‘Is that really how she sees me?’ he wondered, letting his giddiness and apprehension fight it out in the space between his heart and lungs. It was a fact that he was attractive, no doubt, but was it really enough for her to see past everything else? What if it was only true at the time she wrote it? What if it was only true because of Asmodeus’ magic?

The room was heavy with the scent of spent lust and the warmth of the air was unexpectedly cloying. At least the bed was as he’d left it, pulled from the wall. Even without the aid of the glow lanterns, Mamon could see her in the dark; she was sleeping peacefully, her hair a mess highlighted by the white of her pillow, with blankets carefully pulled up over her shoulders.

‘She looks relaxed,’ he thought. ‘Happy?’ Tension from the last two days disappeared from his body. Maybe content was closest to what he could see. She couldn’t be happy without him, could she? The question echoed in his mind ricocheting between swaggering confidence and hopeful uncertainty.

He slid in under the covers next to her, into _his_ spot closest to the wall. “Idiot, you're always saying 'you got this' even when there are tears in your eyes”, he said, the words muttered under his breath. Still propped up on his forearm, he took his time looking at her face. “I know Imma scumbag, but we’re friends; I would move Terra Firma ta be with ya or help ya. You could've called me.”

Hesitantly, he reached forward and stroked her hair. He didn’t want to wake her, didn’t even know if she could wake, but he couldn’t move away. He needed to be close to her.

Even if it was only a temporary lust, he’d admitted to himself that he wanted her to want him. ‘Not good enough for your love though,’ he thought. And yet, he couldn’t live without her attention now either. He continued stroking her hair when she didn’t stir. “I’d be yours if ya asked,” he whispered into the air between them. ‘ So stupid. StupidMammon. Why can't I say these things to her when it counts?’

“The Great Mammon orders ya ta get better soon,” he said, his voice still hushed. He balanced himself on his elbow to kiss her brow. “I don’t want to lose ya...even though you’re not mine to lose.” It didn’t matter that she had been sweating or that she was naked. He cradled her against him, the crown of his head scratched by the twisted headboard when he tucked her under his chin.

When she snuggled herself closer, he froze only to realize that he wasn’t under the flat sheet with her. The only barriers between them were the sheet and his single layer of small clothes, and yet it was enough for him to feel vulnerable and bare without the extra layers and bling. It was just him.

“What I’m tryin' ta say is that I sorta, kinda, maybe, might, slightly, possibly like ya,” he whispered above her, “but don’t let it go ta your head.”

Her hands, that had rested unassumingly against his chest, flexed and gripped his shirt before they stilled as suddenly as they’d begun moving. ‘Like one of Satan’s furry little beasts. Always markin’ up my clothes.’ Would she move again? Knead into him with her little claws and breathy huffs? The way she found her way to him in her sleep like that always made his heart hammer.

‘Could I have misread that page? Misunderstood the look she gave me?’ he wondered, breathing in the scent of her satiated body. She smelled like sin and satisfaction without the disgust and guilt that always followed on sin’s heels. ‘It was just Asmo’s magic.’ There was no reason for her to want him, and hundreds of reasons for her not to. ‘Demons are meant to be tempting that’s all.’ 

Rationality didn't stop the memory of her in his lap from constantly replaying. It didn't change how she’d slid her hand down the bare skin of his back, and bit her lip like she was deciding where she wanted to kiss him first. The heat of her thighs around him then was still enough to melt his will hours later.

“I’m not perfect. I'll annoy ya, piss ya off, say stupid things, then take it all back poorly when I realize,” he murmured into her hair, “but if ya can put up with me, you'll never find anyone who cares for ya more.” What he wouldn’t give to have been called to help her. But no, it was better this way. The less he indulged in his want for her the more in control he’d remain. It was more likely he’d have made a fool of himself anyway. With her, it always seemed to happen.

He heard a sniffle. Was she crying in her sleep? His heart clenched. She'd been so miserable and he hadn't even been home for half of it.

“No more cryin’ allowed,” he whispered and stroked her back. “Can’t have ya gettin’ me all soggy. You’re allowed ta be my squishy heart, but you can’t be gettin' your armor soggy.”

Her giggle shook her frame and he stilled his hand on her back. ‘How long has she been awake? Shit, she’s awake! No, wait, that's good. She’s alive!’ He squeezed her tight, half in fear and half in exaltation. “הַלְלוּ,” he said, the exclamation sneaking out with his exhale.1

“Mammon,” he heard from just beneath his chin, “why do you only say sweet things when you think I can’t hear you?”

“I don't only—Uh, took ya long enough ta wake up. You know to never keep Mammon waitin'!”

“Maaamon,” she called softly from the hollow of his throat.

‘She probably won’t be distracted this time. There's no one here ta draw her attention away,’ he thought. His face burned with heat and his chest felt tight. How much had she heard? “Whaddya need, human. You can’t tell me you’re cold.”

“I heard what you said.”

“You were talkin' in your sleep a lot. I’m sure ya had lots of me in your dreams,” he said, boasting for all he was worth. Could she tell that his lungs were having trouble expanding to make the words?

Her fingertip painting lines along his neck, outlining his Adam's apple and collarbone, before drawing back up to the ridge of his jaw. Her other hand slid down along his torso, petting a smooth path along the contours of his body that were too wide to line up with her own.

“Satan was real worried bout ya,” he said, clearing his throat. “He was pretty shakin’ up, kept thinkin’ you were dyin’ or somethin’.”

“Hmmm. That’s nice,” she said around a yawn. “I’ll have to console him later. Do you think he’ll let me read on his lap again?”

He jolted at her words and pulled her as close as he could before he could stop himself. “You don’t need ta be in anyone’s lap,” he said a bit too gruffly. “If you’re gonna be in anyone’s lap, it should be mine…to keep ya safe’n all.” He was gearing up to rant when he heard her small chuckle from within the cocoon of his arms.

“Mammon, I’m not going anywhere,” she said as her hands slipped away to take up new tasks: one petting his hair, and the other sliding between his neck and the pillow.

Putty in her hands, when he finally managed to clear his mind from the comfort of her fingers he cleared his throat too. ‘This is where lectures are supposed to come in, after the reassurances, right?’ he asked himself, trying to balance his nerves. That’s how it always was when he did something dangerous. “You need ta be more careful—”

“I like you too, Mammon.”

“W-well, of course you do. I’m totally awesome. Who wouldn’t like THE Mammon?”

“But you are very noisy for the middle of the night,” she whispered.

He cut off his one note song, and listened instead as she sighed unhappily. “Breakfast is going to be so awkward tomorrow,” she said, and he watched her discomfort in the dark, glad that she couldn’t see him.

Hand moving in circles again on her back, he tried to placate her. “Nah, dontcha worry ‘bout a thing,” he said. “I’m so obnoxious that they won’t even notice ya.”

“Boisterous,” she said, correcting him automatically. She pulled away enough to try and look at him, and he followed just enough so that she could continue stroking his temple.

“What’re ya starin’ at?” he eventually asked, unnerved. 'Humans can't see in this darkness, right?' He was sure before that they couldn’t; she stumbled often enough without light, but the way she was focused on him now he wasn’t so sure it hadn’t all been an act.

“I’m trying to stop liking you, but you’re very handsome, and pressed up against me,” she said, without guile.

“We’re barely even touchin’!” he said, motioning animatedly at the distance she had put between them. How was he supposed to think properly when she said things like that? After she’d written things like that in her notebook! It was hard enough with the way she smelled of pleasure. His stomach was constantly clenching with want, her scent destroying his thoughts.

“Could you try looking less attractive?” she asked.

This time he sputtered as his brain failed to initiate.

“Stop lookin’ at me like ya want me,” he said, suddenly painfully uncertain. She had a way about her that no matter what he did she could throw him off balance. “We both know you don’t.” He looked away from her blind scrutiny. Shame, frustration, anger, he stuffed them all down. ‘What is she looking at anyway? Why is she taking so long to say something?’ He knew there was nothing on his face. He’d checked before he’d left his room.

“Come’er,” he said, tired of suffering under her appraisal. He drew her close to him again. “Go to sleep.”

Stopping their impending embrace, she leaned up and kissed him. It wasn’t ravenous like her eyes had promised before. It was sweet and soft like her skin. She let him trail his hand beneath the sheet and down her side, only for him to stop when he realized he’d reached her thigh without finding a scrap of clothing.

He wanted to look so badly, but his eyes were already closed. The way she moved her tongue along his lips, and in his mouth, made him dizzy. He’d already been half mast when he’d joined her, and with her kiss, he reconsidered drawing her any closer as a familiar throb made itself known.

His chin still in her hand, she kept him in place with it. “I barely take suggestions, Handsome. What makes you think I take orders?” she asked him with an edge in her voice that he hadn’t expected.

It stopped him from just grabbing her and plastering her against him, showing her what she did to him.

“Come closer,” she said, as she scanned the contours of his barely dressed frame with her hand. “No, snuggle right up, I want you against me.” Laying back down, she waited.

He blushed heavily at her words, trying not to peek, until he was nestled closely to her, careful to keep his erection from touching her. It wasn't like he hadn't been with women before. He'd seen, and been with, plenty of women and demonesses, lots of them, but he hadn't wanted their attention the way he wanted hers. He hadn't made pacts with them.

The gentle hand he'd expected around his waist didn't come, but he found himself snapping his hips against her when she pinched his ass.

“That’s for not listening when I told you 'I like you,'” she said, her words full of disapproval.

“Hey whaddya think you’r—”

“And this,” she said grabbing his ass, keeping him flush against her, “is where you will stay all night as penance for only saying sweet things when you think I’m asleep.”

He knew her arm wasn’t as strong as even one of his fingers, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to remove her small hand from its grip. The turmoil inside continued to build. His lungs wanted to squeeze shut, or were they overexpanded with how he wanted to complain, he wasn’t sure which; but he did know that his hips wanted to move, and his stomach was in knots in the middle of it all.

“Go to sleep, my Mammoney,” she said, whispering against his throat, leaving small kisses until he relaxed against her. “I’ll still be here in the morning.”

He couldn't help burrowing further into her embrace. 'This is enough,' he thought. The ache in his groin was bothersome, but she had soothed the one in his heart enough, and he slept in her arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   1. Hal'lú is the imperative of the Hebrew verb hilél (to praise, glorify, exalt). It's also read right to left! E.g. hal'lu-jah = praise god (Yah as in Yahweh) [ ▲ ]
> 



	30. The 44th Day: Monday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC wakes to find Mammon still in her bed.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

It would be impossible to tell if it was daytime if it weren’t for the glow lanterns overhead, which were bewitched to gradually light her room to match her rhythms. Slowly, she stretched and tried to ascertain what had woken her from her deep sleep.

Recognizing her ceiling and the coziness of her own bed easily, she was pleased that her tiredness was nothing like the grogginess from before. 

“Mammon?” she asked cautiously, when she felt the flutter of his lashes against her skin. She was beginning to suspect she was still asleep. The flat sheet was between them and he clung to her like ivy as before, but that wasn’t what confused her. “What are you doing?”

“Imbuing you with magic to make you heal,” he said as his mouth moved lightly over the exposed hickeys at her neck.

“Are you saying you’re trying to kiss it better?”

There was a pause in the kisses, and no answer before they started again.

She wouldn’t chide him for ignoring her. This was the first time he wasn’t hiding a soft feeling or action behind bravado. “Thank you for looking after me, Mammon,” she said, hugging him instead.

“You better not do this for any of the others,” he said, his lips pressed to her collarbone.

“I can honestly say, I do not do  _ this  _ ,” she said, squeezing him for emphasis, “with the others.”

Content with her words for the moment, she received a few more of his kisses, but all too quickly his body language changed, and he put distance between them.

“These marks,” he said, dragging his finger along the previously well hidden line of love bites, “don’t say you don’t do  _ this _ with the others.”

‘This is not  _ that _ ,”’ she thought, wanting to be petty and specific. If he weren’t so damn hot and cold all the time then maybe he would’ve been the one leaving marks on her, or under her as she shook with desperation and pleasure.

Pushing her snark aside, she pulled herself back into a semblance of calm. ‘Wasn’t I supposed to try to discourage getting involved until I decided  _ how  _ to?’ It was difficult to put her frown away, but she was trying. ’After the last two days, this probably counts as involved,’ she thought, sighing tiredly. Redirection would be safest. “Is that something you’re interested in?”

It was alluring the way he tucked his chin down shyly. Oh how the shy become brave and the brave become shy when it ames to infatuation. If only he was willing to act on it.

“To be honest,” she said when he didn’t reply, “it would be difficult to pursue anything with anyone in the House of Lamentation. No matter who it is, someone else will get their feelings hurt and the last thing I want is to disrupt things when you’re all finally starting to get along.” She pulled the sheet more securely to herself before motioning to the dark purple marks Asmodeus had left behind. “ _ This _ was not expected.”

The way Mammon’s back became ramrod straight and his eyes narrowed, she could imagine him as an angelic soldier once. It was obvious that he wasn’t playing around.

“No way ya can get away with that,” he said. “We don’t have mushy, in between human feelin’s. It’s either ya want somethin’, or like somethin’, or you don’t.”

“I doubt you have no mixed feelings,” she said, considering his words. “I've been around demons long enough now, but you all definitely seem much more…intense about your interests than humans.”

“Who is ‘you all’?” he asked.

It was her turn to be silent. She worried at her lip with her teeth as she decided how best to answer the tremble of his hands while he waited. “I think you can already guess the answer to your question, Mammon, but I won’t answer it because it’ll only cause a fight.”

“You can’t trust the infallible Mammon with the name of your lover? Lovers?” He turned his face away from her, mouth opening silently a few times. “Not that THE Mammon would care about the love life of a puny human.”

She caught his wrist as he started gesturing with his hands. The snarl of his words didn’t surprise her, but they were loud in her face.

“How am I s’posed to do my job of protectin’ ya, if I don’t even know where yer at?” he asked.

Trying to soothe him she brought Mammon closer again. “You’re very intense about your greed for my affection,” she said, and stroked his cheek. “I don’t know what to do. If I answer you, you’ll be upset. If I don’t answer you, you’ll still be upset.”

He pulled away and tossed the bedding aside to stand up and face the wall. “Why ya gotta make this difficult?” he asked, more to himself than her, scrubbing at his face and hair in frustration. “You’re all over my life. It’s your fault I feel this way.” 

A determination fueled his sudden turn, and he crawled back onto the bed and to her side. He pulled her up by her biceps, to match him upright on his knees. They were off center of one another, but belly to belly nonetheless.

“I’m your first man,  _ your  _ demon,” he said. The way he looked at her cheekbones instead of her eyes broadcast that he was waiting for her to reject him, to command him to leave. “No refunds.”

Dropping her forehead against him, she gave a breathy laugh. “Of course, Mammon,” she said, and she meant it. “You’re mine.”

A heavy sigh from her drew his attention away from the stuttered beginning of his triumph.

“However, you’ve just tilted me upright and pressed me to you after hours and hours of orgasming.”

His curiosity overtook his embarrassment and he leaned back to see the evidence of her nightly activities. He could see the slick trail along her inner thighs and how her arousal had soaked into his boxers where his thigh had pressed between hers. The sheet had fallen to their knees when he’d hauled her up, and he swallowed hard in realization. His fingers twitched as he stared, taking in the curves of her body.

“You should get back to your room before anyone is up,” she said. The way he licked his lips, she could see that he wanted a different kind of reassurance. Despite the tenderness of her aching body, she placed her palms against his pecs, testing the waters.

A look of grave concern from Mammon doused any chance of something more. His hands finally moving from their station, they ghosted over new bruises spread across her body: impressions of fingertips, small scrapes, and bite marks. 

She gave his nipple a light twist to jolt him out of his thoughts and keep him from asking anything further. “Please go turn on the shower for me?” she asked tiredly. “I’ll meet you downstairs for breakfast when I’m done.”

He squeezed her hands, and was out of bed like a shot. 

Had she divulged too much? Flopping back onto the bed, she heard the shower turn on, and watched as Mammon strode quickly out of the bathroom and out her front door.

‘This is going to be a problem,’ she thought. Mammon was not one to show restraint when it came to making his feelings known, and when he tried to hide them it only made them louder for their obvious juxtaposition to his actions.

The day ahead was not looking rosy. Breakfast was going to be uncomfortable to say the least, and she was likely going to need to burn her room to forget the things she’d said and done in it.

‘Maybe I can convince Beel to make custard again today…’


	31. Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC braces herself for an awkward breakfast with the boys.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

Having been woken so early by Mammon, she had showered, and even had time to dry her hair properly this morning; she knew she looked presentable but it did nothing to deter Asmodeus’ smarmy expression nor his leering. At least no one else stared. ‘Now if only I felt presentable,’ she thought. It was a task not to show just how sore she was everywhere, yet she couldn’t find it in herself to regret how thoroughly Lucifer had put her through her paces. She struggled to keep from flushing at the memory or at Asmodeus’ knowing grin.

Distraction came in the form of her breakfast companion to the left of her. It was adorable how Beelzebub restrained himself beside her. After eating one serving, which had been mounded high on his plate, he’d slid his hands under his thighs, sitting on them as he stared up at the ceiling and breathed through his mouth, like a child trying to pretend that a prize in front of them didn’t exist. How could she not appreciate the effort he put forth to wait for everyone? 

With her at his side now, he had something else to focus on and he busied himself making her a plate. It was slowly becoming a tradition, no matter what the seating plan was for the month. At first, it had been little morsels for her to try, recommended around a mouthful of food, and eventually it had morphed into this. It was a little unnerving. Just how carefully did he watch what she ate that he could pick out the perfect ratios and keep certain foods from touching? For a demon of gluttony, she supposed it might not be too strange.

A coffee mug had appeared on her right, from she wasn’t certain, but she suspected someone with a tail had placed it at her side while she was watching Beelzebub, that or the Little Demons were becoming exceptionally bold about walking on the furniture.

When Mammon finally joined them, the last at the table, he stopped to look at her as he pulled out his chair, only the slightest of hesitations. A ruffled top and long skirt hid the marks he’d seen on her earlier however his gaze still skittered over where he knew them to be. 

She shrugged off his stare uncomfortably, just as Beelzebub set her plate down in front of her. “Thank you,” she said. It was impossible not to return his beaming smile. She was rarely a morning person, but having her gentle giant smile down at her like that warmed her through and through. It took all of her willpower not to grab him and rub her nose against his, tousle his hair, smatter kisses all over his face, and down his neck, and over his broad shoulders until she could lick poisonberry jelly off his chest. 

Eyes wide at the sudden train of thought, she looked down at her plate. This was Asmodeus’ fault. There was no human that wouldn’t want to touch Beelzebub, sexual or otherwise, he was practically perfect, but it was rare that she didn’t notice her mind wandering down that path. It seemed her libido was now warmed up and practicing for the 100 meter dash rather than the usual brisk jog she perpetually kept rein on.

Asmodeus hummed happily to himself and she did her best to shoot him a look that would bend cutlery with its intensity. He only smiled widely and wiggled in his seat. The idea of aiming her teaspoon for the middle of his face was sounding better every wiggled moment. 

“If you will be joining us this morning,” Lucifer said, his words even before dipping into warning when he set his sights on Mammon, “then we may begin.”

“Oi, slow down, Beel! Leave some for the rest of us,” Mammon said, whatever misgivings he’d had before had fled once he noticed Beelzebub reaching for seconds. He tucked in quickly.

A slow applause was taken up by Asmodeus while he looked across the table to Mammon. “Bravo,” he said. “Bravo.” Just as he liked, all eyes were on him. “I appreciate your opportunism, Mammon. I didn’t think you had it in you!” 

His eyes rimmed with soft pink light that far too often spelled trouble for her in one manner or another.

All eyes turned to Mammon, but his hands were already up in denial. A practiced pose to be sure.

“Come ooon,” Asmodeus said. He was all encouragement and sugar with only a hint of malice. “There’s no need to be shy. I peeked in and saw you in our little human’s bed.”

Mammon’s face was turning redder by the moment. “I—It wasn’t like that. THE great Mammon wouldn’t—”

“Don’t be so coy!” Asmo said with a wink. “I’m sure you showed her a good time. She certainly feels good from here.”

Setting down her drink, she made eye contact with Asmodeus, stealing his attention away from Mammon, despite how he flailed his arms to deny it all. “Asmo,” she said, her voice warning him lightly, “stop teasing Mammon about nothing.” She didn’t need her guardian demon being hazed by his siblings over a misunderstanding.

“Hmmm, hmm, hmmm,” he hummed with delight. “Cuddling is all sweet and innocent until someone gets a boner. There’s no reason to deny it.”

“Asmo,” she warned again, her voice more stern as she carefully broke up a scrambled concoction on her plate, “don’t test me this morning. I haven’t fully forgiven you yet.” She didn't want to give him any more of her attention if he was going to act up and so she found herself admiring the bizarre purple colour of a paté and ignoring him as well as the others who had gone silent.

Beelzebub and Belphegor didn’t bother to hide their exchange of confused glances across the table. They scrounged for signs from the others as to what was happening. 

Lucifer, to her relief, was as stoic as always. Mammon was more useless than ever, while Leviathan was choking on his water despite being able to breathe in it. At least Satan was steadfastly ignoring the scene in favour of his eggs.

“Oh, my Dearest,” Asmodeus said. 

She could hear his pout without seeing it. 

“How can you stay mad when it turned out so well?” he asked, “I mean it’s no me, but I bet he f—”

“Asmodeus,” she said, without looking up from her plate and her exceptionally interesting mug, “If I have to warn you again about this kind of talk at breakfast, you won’t like it.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lucifer lower his hand, choosing to let her continue reining in Asmodeus. There was a curiosity there, in the small curve upward of his lips, which she wasn’t ready to meet head-on yet and she let her sights sweep instead over to Belphegor who was frowning deeply.

“Ooooh! What do you have in mind, Dearest?”

Impassively, she locked eyes with Asmodeus, and ignored the feeling of Beelzebub’s gaze on her, while he ate slowly and quietly. “At least a few tortures you won’t find enjoyment in,” she said before taking another bite. There was no venom in her words. She let them be light and easy. That should have been warning enough.

Satan sat up slightly at the other end of the table, pushing back his shoulders as if he were adjusting his sweater and not trying to hide an excited shudder.

“If you’re the one to do it to me, how can I resist being on your to-do list?” Asmodeus said, eyes flooding with lust until it seeped into the rest of him.

He had the audacity to shimmy his shoulders at her.

“ **Asmodeus, pick up your knife** ,” she said softly, without a hint of malice. He moved only of her volition.

The simultaneous intake of breath around the table was audible. It wasn’t often one of them was able to push her too far, and she’d never before used the pacts to command them. 

Beelzebub turned fully in his chair to watch, and placed his hand gently on her bicep. 

It wasn’t a request to stop as far as she could tell, he continued to eat one handed. If anything he seemed interested, maybe a little proud of her new hard won magical ability. She set her opposite hand over his and stroked it slowly with her thumb.

With a waggle of the blade in his hand, Asmodeus cooed to her, “Ah, a little knife play doesn’t scare me, Darling.”

“Good,” she said, pausing the soothing back and forth of her thumb, because if you keep this up, we’re going to go outside.” She stopped to make sure he was listening. “And I’ll have you flense yourself for every passerby to see, starting with your thighs.” Never breaking eye contact, and using her free hand, she speared the blood sausage on her plate with her fork. “And we  _ will  _ be destroying your clothes in the process.” 

Asmodeus’ cutesy body language dropped away as he squared his shoulders to her. There was a darkness that fluttered around him now that was similar to Leviathan’s at the end of the TSL trivia match, though he had yet to transform. “You wouldn’t have it in you,” he said.

Belphegor shook his head at Lucifer, catching her attention momentarily. Apparently, he wanted to see how far she’d take this. 

“Do you honestly think I spent over thirty hours feeling like I was going to self immolate, and didn't conjure up ways to torture you?” she asked, reaching for the toast that Beelzebub now offered in some sort of attempt at placation. “I’m sure we could find some tenter hooks downstairs. And if you can’t lift yourself on to the hooks I _ know _ I can help you find a way.”

Calmly, at least on the surface, she spread what she hoped was marmalade on her toast. She’d been pitiful for two days, and didn’t want to point fingers, but if Asmodeus wanted to needle her he was going to have to deal with her dusting herself off and kicking over the horse.

Asmodeus’ glowing eyes widened at her promise, but he recovered his flirtiness quickly, the darkness around him lifting. “Well, I never did accuse you of being unimaginative with me,” he said. “I just don’t see why you’re so mad.” 

The way he shifted gears between teasing and pouting didn’t phase her much any more. It was just part of who he was. She accepted the change gladly, eager to get back to a more peaceful breakfast. ‘Maybe after, I’ll find a good book, or listen to some music with Levi. Work with me today, universe?’ She took a bite of her toast, nodding to Asmodeus. “I'd like to move on, please,” she said. “We will treat my ailment like it was a human cold, just a medical issue, which of course is not something to discuss over breakfast.”

Asmodeus made a whining sound and she tried counting to ten. It was uncomfortable in the silence especially as she could see Belphegor’s eyes flitting from demon to demon, taking in their demeanors. 

“Self-immolate?” he asked, mouthing his question to her. 

She took a sip from her mug. The hunger and amusement he looked at her with required her to look away if she wanted to maintain her strong facade. It was too early for this bullshit. 

“I can’t believe you’re making such a fuss just because you fucked Mammon all night,” Asmodeus said, scoffing loudly while crossing his arms and leaning back in his chair. If it weren’t for the flamboyant way he gestured to Mammon, it could have been mistaken for sulking. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. He does have a cute butt.”

Cutlery clattered on a few plates, but she ignored it, not taking her eyes from her impudent demon. Setting her own cutlery down gently, she pushed her breakfast away to make room for her elbows on the table. She folded her hands together, and rested her chin on them. “You did this to yourself,” she said, looking at him sadly, her words full of regret. “Asmodeus, you may choose where, but **I command you to orgasm in the next minute.** ”

He was gone from the table in a flash, and she was grateful he decided not to call her bluff and stay at the table. That would have been an unfortunate end to breakfast. As it was, it was likely to be a very uncomfortable ending for Asmodeus somewhere else in the house as he rushed himself to completion.

“Sorry about that,” she said, but she needn’t have bothered, all of them were trying their best to smother their laughter except for Lucifer who only shook his head with a small smile on his lips, and Beelzebub who continued to eat slowly while in thought.

“I can’t!” she heard from the end of the table before Satan dashed away, still holding his stomach with laughter.

She watched him run off before she felt something scratching at her ankle. Immediately, she scooted her chair back to find the source. ‘A Little Demon!’ Thank goodness nothing had escaped the table to slime her again. Ignoring her breakfast companions, she leant down to greet it. “Why, hello there,” she said, “and who might you be?” It seemed much bigger than the other Little Demons she knew.

“Fluuangt” spilled forth from its ever widening mouth. She could only tilt her head sideways and watch in fascination as its tongue protruded from its round body and pushed one of her slippers out from between its sharp teeth.

Using only her finger and thumb, she picked it up, surprised that the fluffy thing was still dry. “You’re such a sweetling,” she said, picking up the now shrunken demon in her palm. “I knew I misplaced my slippers somewhere. Thank you very much!”

It gave a squeaky grumble as she scritched it. ‘It’s nice to meet a demon who isn’t causing me trouble!’ she thought. 

Its little purr of self-congratulation seemed to perk up the bigger demons at the table as well, and to her surprise it scrambled up her arm and jumped off the back of her chair. Its presence was quickly replaced by another Little Demon who was dragging a second fluffy slipper behind it.

She scooped it up in her hands before it could climb under her skirt. ‘Cheeky thing!’ she thought. Based on the way its claws had trailed up her foot to her hem, this was clearly one of Asmodeus’ ilk. 

Now holding it at table height, she cooed at it as it hugged her thumb. “And thank you as well.” She smooched a finger on her other hand and pressed it to where she thought its cheek ought to be.

“Hey, hey! Cut that out!” Mammon said, the redness of his face finally under control. “I don’t need to watch a human be all flirty.”

Her eyes wide with false innocence and confusion, she turned to him, letting the Little Demon hop from her hand on to Mammon’s shoulder. Its tail slapped him in the ear as it jumped away, and she just barely kept the smile from her face. If Mammon couldn’t say something nice or nothing at all then she didn’t mind letting the Little Demons get the best of him.

Only Leviathan had managed to catch a glimpse of the impishness that danced in her eyes, but it was quickly diverted into something softer when Beelzebub plunked a piece of fruit onto her empty plate. She knew she hadn’t finished the waffle-like tower he’d filled her plate with previously, and she was beginning to suspect he was actively ranking her food choices by whether she got to them before he did.

With a sigh, she grabbed the bottom of her chair and began to hop it forward. Before she could properly begin to snug up to the table on her own, Beelzebub reached behind her and pushed her chair in as if he were nudging a napkin forward.

She hoped her small gasp was attributed to the quick movement and not to her sudden urge to climb Beelzebub. It shouldn’t be so easy to impress and turn her on like that. Even if his arm did reach all the way around her, and he used barely any effort to move her, it was still just Beelzebub: sweet, adorable, I bet he gives amazing cunnilingus Beelzebub. 

This was Asmodeus’ fault. All she could think about now was how easily Beelzebub had lay back for her in her bed and how she’d love to corner him again. She grit her teeth. ‘Unclenching thighs in three, two, one...’ Reaching for her breakfast she pinned something moving on the plate with her spoon.

“Beel,” she said, proud of the evenness in her voice, “no living things, please?”

Definitely still a pervert after the lust magic wore off, she had to actively look away from him. His arm reached across her to remove the offending creature, and his forearms flexed in a way that she wanted to touch. 

Forgetting that Beelzebub was eating something living, her eyes followed his hand’s journey to his mouth where she focused on his lips, and the way he swallowed. ‘Get it together. You don’t have the energy for another round much less the energy to explain why you’re all bruised up. Stop staring at his neck!’ She fiddled with something green on her plate while she gathered herself. 

By the time she reined in her libido, the remainder of the table had also started to settle down, and an awkwardness was setting in. ‘If only Satan would return,’ she thought. ‘His grin would be enough to set them all off.’ They’d take one look at him and crack up all over again. It was the same smile that also roped her into taking part in one of his pranks.

She cleared her throat. “Um, would anyone be able to escort me to the grocer this afternoon or evening? There are a few items I want to pick up,” she asked.

"Aaah, I'm tired of this. Why do I have to help you out?” Mammon asked. No one at the table bought his bravado.

“I can take you,” Belphegor said, cutting in before Mammon could continue with his lamentations any further.

“Wait a minute! It’s my job, I can’t just go handing her off to anyone.”

“I have some time. It’s not a problem,” Belphegor said.

“It’s my job to—”

Unconcerned by the argument brewing, Beelzebub partially stood to reach across her and collect more food from near Mammon. She knew he hadn’t done it on purpose, he was just hungry, but did he have to practically put himself in her lap? If Asmodeus were still at the table he’d already be planning their honeymoon based on the heat of her cheeks alone.

“Oi, wipe that look off your face! Show some respect for your older brother when he’s talking to you.” Mammon said.

Craning her neck away from the Beelzebub’s back and shoulders, she found herself looking directly at Mammon. It wasn’t often she saw Mammon respond to his brothers’ disrespect and actually mean it. Usually, he covered his defeat with frustration and deflection, but now there was a fierceness that took her by surprise. 

Belphegor was still hidden from her view by Beelzebub, but the look he gave Mammon must’ve been something special if the reaction it elicited was anything to go by.

“Sorry,” Beelzebub whispered to her when he planted his hand on the edge of the table between her and her plate to better leverage himself forward. His fingertips had caught at the lip of a plate nearly on the other side of Mammon and he was making a concerted effort to pull it toward him, finger tip by tip.

A sulky-growl, which she usually took for a negative from Belphegor, sounded out on the other side of the table followed by one word, “ _ Luciiii _ ?” 

Choking quietly on her food, she tried to tamp down the memories of last night. She’d only been able to get that many syllables out a few times then as well. He'd had her brokenly saying his name in a different tone, but Belphegor’s whine was enough to remind her of the hours Lucifer had spent satisfying her until she was too exhausted to move. At least Beelzebub was between them so Lucifer couldn’t watch her eyes go wide.

“Mammon, leave Belphegor alone,” Lucifer said, clearly already tired of the posturing. “I’m sure he can handle a simple walk to the store and back without your company.” With barely a breath between his first chastisement and his next, he continued, “Beelzebub, sit down before you smother the poor girl.”

‘The poor girl,’ she thought. He’d sounded so much different when he’d scolded her last night.  _ Little Girl _ had taken on a very different meaning for her now. But that was just a one off.  _ That _ had been for pity’s sake and her survival, for his reputation. No matter how good it had been, it had been for Diavolo’s program, not for her and she needed to remember that. 

Fidgeting in her seat, she took a deep and silent breath, holding it as she tried to talk herself out of touching Beelzebub. He was just so close and in her space. It was difficult to believe he wasn’t doing it on purpose. It would be an innocent touch, hardly anything at all. She doubted he’d even notice, but it would be a small satiety after putting up with so much temptation and snark before she’d even finished her coffee. 

With a covert flick of her left hand, her fingers dragged along the back of Beelzebub’s thigh when he moved to straighten. He stuttered in his attempt to push himself up and she bit her tongue to keep from letting her hand rise higher. Before Beelzebub could turn to look at her, she dropped her hand away but she needn’t have worried. He sat down quickly only to stare at his twin. 

With no further debate around her, she let out the breath she’d been holding. “Afternoon or evening?” she asked Belphegor.

“Might as well get it out of the way while I’m still awake,” he said. “After breakfast.” It sounded like it was the last thing he wanted to do: a sleepier version of Mammon’s I’m-so-hard-done-by tone. 

‘Poor babies,’ she thought sarcastically. All Belphegor did was sleep and skip class or occasionally try to bully her into doing his homework. How hard could a walk to the shops with her be? Would it kill him to put in a little effort? She lifted her mug and drank to give herself time. He had kissed her like he’d had a damn instruction manual for her, so he must’ve put in effort at some point in his life. 

“Sounds good,” she said and took up the last bite remaining on her otherwise spotless plate. Everyone else seemed to have finished as well and mumbled their thanks for breakfast before dispersing.

“Leviathan, don’t be late for your meeting at the docks,” Lucifer called after his brother. 

He only scuttled away faster.

“Dance and gym at two?” Beelzebub asked, already standing and beginning to collect empty plates.

The pads of her fingertips still tingled from where they’d kissed the fabric over Beelzebub’s tight thighs. “Two shouldn’t be a problem, unless Belphie falls asleep on the way home,” she said, trying to fall back into an easy camaraderie. It was obvious he’d noticed her touch, and part of her felt a thrill run through her at the thought but another echoed warnings in the back of her mind. “I’m still pretty tired though, so I’ll likely only be spotting you today.”

He nodded and turned to make his way to the kitchen, taking away her view of his adorable blush.

She could only imagine that he was remembering their kisses, but it was hard for her to be phased by that after the barrage of sexuality she'd withstood over the last couple days. ‘Should I be concerned that kissing demons has been normalized for me?’ she wondered. ‘Should I discourage Mammon’s innocent "healing" kisses then?’ A sense of loss came with the thought. Maybe she should cut this all out now before it got any further out of control.

“We should get going,” Belphegor said, breaking her train of thought. “It’s not far, but I can still show you a shortcut.”

They slowly walked out of the dining room together, and she hopped to pull on her slippers as he walked ahead of her.

“Oh, but don’t get me wrong.” He smiled softly, but there was something else behind his eyes. “I am being nice to you now, but I’ll make sure you return the favour in the long run.”

“What do you need in return?” she asked warily, remembering distinctly how his hand had gently closed around her throat before crushing it. Her reaction wasn’t ridiculous but she also napped with him fairly regularly now. She shouldn’t be so suspicious. He was trying hard, in his own way.

“Don’t you think it would be awfully nice of a demon to tell you that?” he asked. 

The question was mocking and yet she found herself wanting to find out how nice he’d be willing to be. Hadn’t he tried to seduce her earlier? She wrinkled her nose at him, but he wasn’t wrong about that. All of his brothers tended to spoon feed her answers.

“Isn’t it about time you started thinking for yourself?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “Okay,” she said, unwilling to play further into his teasing. Really, any favour he chose to ask for wasn’t likely to be something he wouldn’t have asked of her before. Now he just had an excuse.

“Well, you know what you have to do, so go get ready. I’ll come get you in a minute,” he said, waving her off.

His attempt to hide his pout at her halting of his game amused her. Turning on her heel, she headed to her room, rolling her eyes at Belphegor’s bossiness as she went. Overall, she was grateful that breakfast had been short and not quite as painful as she had expected. 

At least Lucifer hadn’t made her explain her “ailment”, although whether Asmodeus would keep quiet or sing to the heavens about her evening pursuits was another matter altogether. With some things he was terrible at keeping a secret.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you'll forgive the transition/housekeeping <3


	32. Shopping with Belphegor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very tired MC and a very tired Belphegor go shopping.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

Changing out her slippers, she snatched up a bag and a cozy vest just as a knock came at her bedroom door. Rushing over, Before her caller could open the door she did so herself, stepping over the threshold, and closing it firmly behind herself.

It meant she was a little closer than she’d intended to be toBelphegor, but at least he wouldn’t get sight of the wreck that was her room, and hopefully nothing of the lingering scent of sex. The last thing she needed to do was hand him more ammunition for teasing her. ‘Hopefully, the bathroom fan and the candles will help with that while I’m out,’ she thought. ‘Although, accidentally letting the candle burn it all down is a close second for options at this point.’

“Ready,” she said, waiting for him to move out of the way. She had turned quickly during her exit, and the hand not currently on the door knob was bent so that it rested on the frills of her shirt and zipper of her vest to avoid colliding with him.

“You know, bringing your body almost flush against mine is a very tempting way to tell me you don’t want to go to the grocery store today,” he said, as he brought his hand next to the dip of her waist, pressing his palm against the door behind her.

She was close enough to brush the fine hair on his arm. ‘Damn it.’ she thought, and took a calming breath. “Definitely ready to go to the grocery store,” she said. “If you would step back?”

“Do you always open your door and nearly rub yourself along the body of anyone who knocks?”

She forgot she was supposed to exhale. “Only sometimes,” she said.

There was no point in trying to remain serious in this household. If she did, her and Mammon would never get up to their adventures, and her head would have exploded long before now.

Belphegor rolled his eyes and tugged her along by the wrist.

“I can make my way out of the house without a lead, you know?” she said, wiggling the wrist in his grasp. It actually was a little sore. She had not been thoughtful of this morning the night before.

“Stop complaining,” he said, but there was no spite in it. If anyone had asked her, it sounded like he just wanted to hold her hand, even if he did so at a pace or two ahead of her.

“Slower, please,” she said, after they'd travelled for a few minutes. “You all walk too fast for me.”

His legs were probably about as long as Beelzebub’s, and he was definitely walking at more than a leisurely stroll.

“Is everything okay?” she asked as he slowed to allow her at his side, still keeping her wrist in his hand.

“Hmmm,” he said, and she watched the wind ruffle his hair out of his eyes. “Just tired.”

“Isn’t that your thing?” she asked in confusion.

“Extra tired,” he said, “I’m trying to be awake for mornings now and Beel won’t let me sleep.”

“Ooooh,” she said knowledgeably. “Is he eating food in the middle of the night with crinkly packaging again?”

“Something like that.”

“Ah, that’s really terrible. I had to make him go stay in the kitchen to eat when we shared your room.”

He stopped, and because he still had her in his grip she stopped, looking back and up at him.

“Belphie?”

“Sorry, I’d just forgotten you’d shared our room...” he said. “Did you end up in my bed?”

She could see the faint outline of a grin trying to form. “Nope,” she said, tugging him along now, “I took Beel’s bed. He wouldn’t let me sleep in yours.”

He gave a low whistle. “Put him on the couch in his own bedroom. _Tsk tsk tsk_.”

“Heeey, he decided on the sleeping arrangements,” she said, “though he would sometimes forget. Good cuddler.” 

If she could have clicked her tongue at herself in disappointment she would have. His playful smile had evapourated. A little more territorial than she had anticipated if even Beelzebub was considered a threat. ‘Something I’ll need to work on, especially seeing as I’ll be going home in a few months time,’ she thought. ‘How has he managed to put up with Mammon then?’ 

“Belphie, may I have my arm back?”

“You’re not using it,” he said, his inflection indifferent.

“No, but it _is_ sore,” she said, looking back at him again. “Would you hold my hand instead?”

He stopped them again, and turned her hand over and back with care. The skin was only faintly discoloured at the wrist, but he tugged at her stretchy sleeve, pushing it up her forearm, and found more mottled skin.

At first he had worried that he had harmed her, but he tucked her hand into his side pocket, without her fussing, while he moved to inspect the other arm. From what peeked out there, it was the same. This hand he kept in his as he brushed aside her hair and the collar of her vest. ‘How had they all not noticed at breakfast?’ he wondered, trying to stamp out his worry. ‘It goes all the way up to her neck.’ He wanted to tug at the ruffled collar to see how far the nearly imperceptible pattern went down, but abstained from undressing her in public. 

She batted away his seeking hand with the one she retrieved from his pocket, and began walking again.

Hand in hand they walked together in silence until Belphegor broke it, unable to stay quiet any longer on the empty street. “I know Beel wouldn’t be this rough with you,” he said, his voice gritty with concern and anger. ‘Or this thorough in such a short time,’ he thought. “What happened?”

“It’s no big deal,” she said, batting aside his almost accusation with only a blush. “I tried out some lotions and potions with Asmo this last week. I had a bit of a reaction recently though.” She tried not to look directly at Belphegor. It wasn’t technically a lie; they just happened to besbe thoughts said close together. "It's not something I want to get into right now.’’

“Ah yes, your ‘medical ailment’ that only Asmodeus seems to be aware of.”

He watched her gaze skitter away again. “Or perhaps others besides Asmodeus are aware as well?” 

Her step faltered, almost imperceptibly, but it was confirmation enough for him. ‘It’s possible that only Beelzebub and I are in the dark,’ he thought. ‘It might explain Satan not returning to breakfast, and why no one else chimed in during the exchange. Well, perhaps not Levi.’ Something to look into. Lucifer did remind him often that he could be overly suspicious. This could be nothing too.

A ' _Hnnn '_ was the only sound she heard from him followed by silence for the next few minutes, their hands still together.

She fiddled with her D.D.D. before looking up again, keeping pace and trusting him not to let her walk into any carnivorous plant beds or lamp posts. “Do you mind if we stop briefly at the stationery shop and the apothecary? They’re only a few doors down, and I shouldn’t take too long.”

“If you won’t take long,” he said.

Glancing up from behind her D.D.D. she peeked at him. He must be exceptionally tired of he couldn't even muster the energy bro be his bratty self. She found herself missing the banter.

The grocery shopping went without incident and the chocolate making supplies easily acquired. Belphegor reminded her to pick up curry paste, and ink cartridges for Beelzebub were also quickly found at the stationery store.

Waiting impatiently outside the apothecary, at her request, Belphegor leant against the structure. He was curious. ‘Maybe she needs a compound or potion for her “allergic reaction?”’ he wondered. ‘But surely humans aren’t actually that fragile. None that I met before had been.’ He wasn’t convinced. They looked like regular bruises to him. 

“NO, Amalthea! SNAKES DO _NOT_ GO THERE!” he heard her shout, slamming the door behind her, and stalking past him.

He caught up without issue, fueled by intense curiosity.

“UGH!” she said, groaning her frustration. “I know Satan says she’s an eudemonium, but I am quite certain there is nothing kind about her!” She knew Belphegor was behind her without looking, and was glad she wouldn't have to backtrack to collect him.

Striding faster than she should, her legs were likely going to turn to jelly again. It would be her luck to have to ask Belphegor to carry her home.

She paused near a bush, bringing her hand up to shield the side of her face, and the other to sweep her hair away.

When she spat vehemently into the foliage, Belphegor was surprised. Surprised, but very amused. ‘Perhaps today won’t be a total waste,’ he thought, ‘just walking with her is amusing enough.’ 

“That good?” he asked, unable to keep frowning while she let out her spite.

“bLeCh!” she said. “She always makes me drink it in front of her. The worst! And the things she suggests! I might actually have to find a witch. Nothing is worth this. _Snakes_ of all things?”

He let her ramble, and replied to her lamentations in Infernal speech, which only served to prolong the extreme rise and fall of her outraged pitch. ‘I wonder if she knows what I’m saying? Her success rate is better than guessing.’ Carefully, he extinguished the smile he’d had since they’d begun walking back.

“You still owe me a favour,” he said as the House of Lamentation came into sight.

“And what might that be?” she asked sweetly, finally having overcome her contempt for the apothecary.

“Music,” he said. “Join me in the attic for music after we get home.”

“I’d really like that,” she said.

He tried not to match her smile, but she took his hand in hers, swinging it between them, and he couldn’t not.

‘Maybe the universe did hear me this morning,’ she thought.


	33. Worry and Lace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor and MC go on a shopping expedition and Beelzebub does a little bit more than the dishes.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

“So, you think she’s back to normal now?” Mammon asked, hovering over Satan.

“Seems to be,” he said, eyes still glazed with fading mirth. “She didn’t wear a full coverage outfit, I doubt she would otherwise.”

Satan picked a book from the side table stack and waited, content to continue lounging on the couch. It wouldn’t take long for Mammon to interrupt with whatever was really on his mind.

“You think it was Asmo’s fault?” Mammon asked.

Resting the book open on his chest, he looked up, unperturbed as he hadn’t actually been reading. ‘No point in frustrating myself,’ he thought. He adjusted the pillow under his back. “Seems likely,” he said, filtering through their interactions. “Although, it took her three rounds of experimentation to be certain it was related to Asmodeus; Which makes me wonder, to what else she would have attributed it? Whatever ‘it’ was.”

“She won’t talk about it.”

“Yes, she made that abundantly clear at breakfast,” Satan said, and the fresh memory had him dabbing a tear from the corner of his eye.

“What’s she hidin’ that she can’t tell us?” Mammon asked forcefully, as if his voice alone would summon the answer.

“Hmmm. Humans are often quite shy about their sexuality, Mammon. Depending on the time, place, gender, culture, marital—”

“Ya, ya. I get it,” he said, pausing behind the back of the couch, “but I don’t have ta like it.”

Satan lifted the book from his chest, pretending to read once more and, letting Mammon get it all out. This wasn’t the first time he’d listened to his ramblings. So long as it didn’t pertain to money, it was likely to end soon.

“I saw her, you know. Asmo wasn’t completely wrong, but I didn’t—She was bruised everywhere, Satan: Scratch marks, bite marks, burst marks under her skin…” Mammon’s shoulders rose and fell as if he were trying to drop bristling fur from his spine.

Sitting up, Satan closed his book. It wasn’t often that Mammon was this close to distraught, even rarer that he shared it.

“You think Asmo was too rough with her?”

“I don’t know!” he shouted, throwing his hands in the air. “I mean he could've, but the way she’s bein' so secretive. I just don’t like it. How hard would it be ta say Asmo caught her off guard? She should be able to trust me—us!”

Satan strummed his fingers against his chest. “She could be too proud to admit it after avoiding his advances for so long,” he offered, but Mammon didn’t seem placated with that, 'or they had been remiss in their guarding duties from outside entities,' he considered. He stood, letting Mammon know he had his full attention. “You are correct, it is unusual for her to be so secretive with us. She’s usually very open, if occasionally coy. My primary concern, however, is how greatly she was affected despite her known ability to be  _ un _ affected by Asmodeus’ powers.”

Mammon stopped pacing. Clearly, he hadn’t considered that yet. He flexed his fingers in his hair, close to pulling.

“I have literature which I had previously put aside to look into her impervious nature. I’ll review some of them today, and see if I can find something to explain it. However, this occurrence may not have a prior precedent,” he said, lowering both his shoulders and forehead in careful thought, transfixing Mammon with his seriousness. “There have been very few humans who have manifested celestial heritage before.”

"Well, that ain't bad," Mammon said, the words at first mumbled to himself before he spoke up. "I'm gonna get going, but I'll find you later today, so don't slack off."

With a wistful sigh, Satan looked at his abandoned book. It seemed Edogawa’s ‘The Face’ would have to wait until another day. Oddly, he didn’t find that he minded. It was reassuring the way Mammon’s posture had changed, confidence in his detective skills certain. ‘Besides, a new mystery awaits!’ he thought.

* * *

Beelzebub cleared the dishes, and with them his head.

The grumpiness from Belphegor had only been a minor echo this morning, with the tiniest ripple of satisfaction when Mammon had relinquished his claim to escorting the human, but Beelzebub still found himself frazzled.

It had been more than a day since she’d touched him, and kissed him like she was dying of thirst for his mouth. 

He cursed, having accidentally dropped a soapy platter back into the wash tub, distracted by the memory of her pressing him back into the pillows.

When she’d come down for breakfast this morning, it was as if nothing had happened. ‘The same smile. The same hellos,’ he thought, beginning to feel like he’d imagined it all. ‘Only her flaunting control over Asmodeus has changed. No, that’s not true. She also didn’t say anything when I touched her arm either.’ That usually would gain him at least a glance. He continued to wash up the plates.

Today wouldn’t be easy. It had been difficult to resist pulling her from her chair, and sitting her in his lap this morning, even if she would have been embarrassed. It would have been enough just to feel the small weight of her again.

‘At the very least, at least I know Belphegor is too drained to get up to any real mischief with her today,’ he thought. He’d seen to that. 

Leviathan had begun drying dishes next to him, and Beelzebub wasn’t entirely sure when he’d started helping. ‘Deep breath. Stop being so distracted. Think unsexy thoughts. Don’t imagine her thighs around you. Think of slime molds and ugly food! Think of Levi’s room after a week-long binge of TSL.’

Not even those images were enough to derail his train of thought. He knew it was because hadn’t seen to himself. ‘She smelled like satisfaction,’ his traitorous mind supplied.

Dishes complete, and left overs thoroughly labelled with his name, he threw down the kitchen towel, and stomped his way back to his room. If Belphegor was going to be out with her, at least that meant he could be alone to let off some of his own steam.

Opening the bedside table drawer, he cursed again, though whether it was because of the red, lacy scrap of cloth there, or the key he’d forgotten to give her, he didn’t know. Maybe it was the image of one cushioning the other that sent the strong pulse of want to his groin.

Beelzebub sighed and relented. He may have spent Belphegor all of yesterday, and last night, but if he remained like this, he was liable to accidentally eat her instead of dance with her later today.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, he nervously collected the flimsy bra from the drawer, considering its lines between the pads of his thumb and fingers. He liked the delicate and slightly rough texture of it over his skin. ‘It’s not embarrassing if she gave it to me,’ he thought as he lay back, resting the bra on his chest. Working at the fastening of his pants, he could tell from this close that it still smelled like her skin.

The way the fabric would cup her flesh flashed in his mind. The way his hands would follow its lines, and the texture of the lace on her cool skin. He pumped himself slowly to the image, but it wasn’t enough any more.

Not content, he supplemented his imagination with his own memory of her on top of him. “I don’t care,” she’d said, even as the door shook with Mammon’s knock. His hip rose off the bed.

He imagined the panties that must match the bra he currently worried between his fingers, inching along the fabric like a rosary. Keeping his prayers quietly to himself. ‘How would it feel to have only this fabric between us as she ground herself on me? Would she take both my horns in hand for balance?’ He hadn’t realized he had fisted the flimsy material around his shaft until he was cumming into it.

Panting, he lay there, still wanting. ‘I can’t return it to her like this…but I also don’t want to wash away the last traces of her scent either.’ He groaned in frustration.

At least Belphegor still felt irritable.


	34. Language Arts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor introduces MC to music and interpreting Infernal Speech.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

Dropping off her “spoils of war,” as Leviathan would call them, she made sure to tape shut that particular kitchen cupboard, labelling it with “NO DEMONS ALLOWED”. She knew Mammon would open it, but he would only be confused when he found the bitter ingredients for chocolate making, and some curry paste.

Not bothering to put away her bag or vest, she headed to the attic, where Belphegor had told her to meet him when they’d parted at the front hall.

“Belphie?” she asked, calling up from the first step of the winding staircase. “Are you up there already?”

“Finish coming up, and I'll let you know,” he said, his voice echoing down to her.

‘He must revel in being a smart ass,’ she thought as she began to climb.

With confusion, she stopped at the top landing, not entering the attic, nor putting down her bag. ‘How did I never notice them all hiding behind the drapery and fabrics?’ she wondered, watching as Belphegor shifted large speakers out from the corners of the room, and tipped them over. 

“I thought we were listening to music?” she asked, as she stepped through the doorway, depositing her bag on the floor next to her.

“We are,” he said, “but right now you’re in the way.”

A small yelp escaped her as he gripped her waist and tossed her on to his old bed. The urge to scold him was great, but the strange mixture of giddiness and dissatisfaction kept her from speaking up. ‘Better not to say anything if I don’t even know what I want to say,’ she thought. She brushed those feelings away, reorienting herself to enjoy the fluffiness of the mattress but still watch him move heavy items like they were nothing.

“Okay!” he finally said and motioned for her to get up.

She skipped over, curious, and willing to believe this could be something fun.

He held out his hand impatiently, in a manner very similar to Mammon asking for money. “Hand over your shoes, socks and vest.”

“What?”

“I said, hand over your—”

“No, I know what you said. Why?” she asked, brow furrowed with suspicion. “You’ve arranged a bunch of speakers like a summoning circle, and now you want some of my clothes.”

“And?”

“Belphie,” she said, her voice low and skeptical, “are you just going to burn my things, and hurtle me back to Earth with this?”

He looked shocked for a moment, almost dropping the vest as she handed it to him. For once, her sarcasm had caught him off guard.

She was fairly sure this time that his irritation was fake, and knew it without a doubt when he couldn’t keep eye contact with her as she grinned. ‘Score one for me!’

“Alright,” he said, her belongings in hand. “Lay down on the floor.”

She looked at him, and then back to the floor. “I think we’re going to have a repeat of our last conversation, care to skip to the end?”

“You seem to struggle a bit with understanding Infernal, either in low or high speech,” he said as he put her items with her bag, “So, you’re going to listen to music through the floorboards with me.”

It didn’t make sense to her, but he wasn’t chanting and burning her shoes, so she shrugged and lay down in the concentric circle of speakers.

“Why do you have so many speakers?” she asked.

“I couldn’t communicate with anyone, and no one could hear sound from this room, so Lucifer was kind enough to at least let me have music. I spent most of my time listening or sleeping.” He joined her to gaze at the ceiling he knew far too well. “Hands flat on the floor,” he said, as he raised a small device in his hand.

‘If Asmodeus has given him some sort of sex toy, I will have him commit seppuku,’ she thought, but she was quickly abashed by her assumption when a low thrum of sound moved through the floorboards. 

“Before acquiring the power to express and articulate in languages, humans used musical notes and rhythms,” she heard Belphegor say from his place at her left. “Both Infernal and Celestial are spoken in much the same rhythms still today.”

“So, even if I don’t understand the words, I should have a better idea of the meaning if I get the melody?”

“You seem to do okay with the Little Demons, but their body language also helps, they can’t hide their intentions as easily either, but, hopefully, this will give you a better idea of the intentions and meaning behind words.”

She turned her head to look at him. The floor was hard, even as it buzzed, but her smile was wide. This was unexpected and wonderful. At least she hoped it would be.

A puff of air blew some of the hair out of Belphegor’s eyes. He could practically feel her glee, and he was caught between telling her she was making too big a deal of nothing, and wanting her to continue smiling at him. ‘At the very least this might help her avoid some trouble,’ he thought. ‘Not that she would have to if her idiot guardian would do his job.’

“Thaaank you, Belphie,” she said.

He turned to look at her. “You can sing your exaltations of me later,” he said, and this time, some of the heat returned to his eyes. When she looked away he tugged at her hand, holding it in his. “Don’t be like that. I purposefully chose the attic so you would feel safe.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is a place where I was at my weakest, and where you were strong enough to break the enchantment,” he said, plainly. Not that he would get into territory and empowerment theory with her, or break down why the opposite was also true. What he wanted today was to give her a small layer of protection and understanding, and if he was lucky the music would reinforce a sense of belonging. ‘Hopefully of belonging to and with me,’ he thought. Accustomizing her to Infernal speech was an activity that didn't require any standing or walking, and if it just so happened to keep her safe _and_ draw her closer to him then it was a happy bonus.

The speakers around them changed beats as he clicked the device a number of times. “Music is more than sound,” he said, as the melody of pulses moved through the boards and their bodies. “It's an organized sound, deliberately created to elicit responses.” He enjoyed the feeling of her hand still held within the his. ‘Responses both conscious and unconscious,’ he thought. 

A rhythmic squeezing of her hand to the beat of a single bar, and he saw her jolt with surprise in his periphery. “It can motivate actions on a very animalistic level,” he said, continuing to lecture. ‘Pleasurable music lights up the same parts of the mind as heroin and orgasm’ he thought, recalling the facts with amusement. ‘Something to test out with her later.’ Today, the music would only be used for innocent learing, even if it wasn’t entirely altruistic on his part.

“The colour, texture of sound, its timbre, they all determine how you interpret it. I can play a half second of melody, and you will already know your feelings on it,” he said, confident in his assertion.

“So, how is this supposed to help?”

“There are plenty of innate acoustic features you control: tempo, volume, timber, but many are also learned: harmony, tonality, melodic progression, an instantaneous response to instruments or voices that all mix into one sound,” he said, just as a new harmony joined in beneath them. “ _Your_ problem is territory and background.”

There was no answer to his explanation, but when he saw her eyes close he knew she was listening. “Put your feet flat like mine are.”

She moved to sit up and tuck her skirt, but he read her intentions, and two fingers on her breast bone kept her glued to the floor. 

‘Weren’t we holding hands further apart?’ she wondered. Nowhere untoward had been touched while keeping her pressed to the floor, but it highlighted for her how close he was that he could pin her with ease. “I’m wearing a skirt,” she said as if that settled the matter.

“I didn’t say take it off. I said put your feet flat.”

She didn’t move and she heard him sigh. ‘So hard done by,’ she thought sarcastically. 

“You’re not facing the door, and I certainly can’t see anything from here,” he said, muttering just loud enough to be heard over the music.

Slowly, she brought her legs up to plant her bare feet on the floor boards, and he watched the fabric pool at the tops of her thighs, and bunch around her hips. “It’s your own fault for not wearing underwear,” he said. 

He could practically hear the whiplash when she looked at him! Almost hear the tiny outrage on her parted lips. “Oh my, I seem to have hit the nail on the head,” he said, and this time the eyes that met hers were full of devious interest. “Perhaps I should have had some fun with you while we were out, if you were going to dress for the occasion.”

“My choice of undergarments is not the topic of study today, Belphegor!” she said, her words squeaked at the end and she was grateful that the music rose up and drowned her out.

As if nothing had happened, he continued once the music died down to quiet shivers running through their limbs. “Whether music comes from your own social territory, or elsewhere will determine how you feel it. Where you are will also determine how you feel its meaning."

“This feels familiar,” she said.

“It should, it’s from the human world, only a couple centuries old.”

“It feels both happy and sad though.”

“Good, you are correct. We’ll try something away from home now.”

“...It seems angry? No, busy?” she asked, scrunching up her face in thought. 

“Imagine you’re outside, between the lava flows, and the dracunculus plants. Imagine the heat, and the scent of the flowers, and the weight of the darkness around you. Now keep listening.” 

He waited.

“It’s uncompromising? It feels like when Satan and Lucifer argue.”

“Good,” he said, pleased with how quickly she was already deciphering undertones. “You won’t be comfortable, and able to easily comprehend quickly, if you’re still thinking as though you’re in your familiar spaces. You must _willingly_ enter our domain in your mind to have that instantaneous understanding.”

‘He’s good at this,’ she thought. ‘He isn't just the little terror that asked me to call Satan by the wrong name, steals me for naps when I have plans, or lives to get a rise out of others in general.’ She spread the fingertips of her free hand and flexed her toes, trying to hear and see more. ‘Once Belphegor must’ve been diligent about this kind of thing.’ She closed her eyes, happy to be in his company, and able to see this little sliver of his old Celestial self.

He peeked at her: she was smiling, eyes closed, entranced, and breathing in time to the music. Clicking the device again, everything vibrated faster. It would be familiar to her, but every so often, something should feel wrong.

“What _is_ this?” she asked, clearly distressed as she raised her shoulders to try and shelter her head.

“It is your country’s anthem, sped up dramatically, and every few bars, one of the notes is played incorrectly. It _should_ jar you significantly.”

As he played another familiar tune, with the same problem, she scrunched up her nose with distaste. He could see her shifting uncomfortably at the edge of his vision. “It should be like nails on a chalkboard, or loud cymbals in the middle of Chopin’s soft movements.”

“What’s the point of this lesson?” she said, practically whining as her hands twitched. ‘Ugh. I just want to cover my ears. Maybe he is still a jerk after all.’

“When something incongruent appears in music, it arouses a strong emotional response. You just need to be familiarized with the regular cadence of Infernal first to know when something is 'off'.” He clicked the device again. “Like this,” he said, letting a new refrain buzz through her. It was slow and mournful.

She could feel her body beginning to relax until even her legs were tempted to fall away from one another. It was a song she knew but couldn’t name. And then there was silence, with only her heartbeat for company. It felt like the ocean carrying the melody further away until it grew quieter and quieter in her mind with each note and every wave.

“Did you fill in the rest of the sound you expected?” he asked.

She nodded before she realized he was still looking straight ahead. “Yes,” she said, humming the last of it and tapping her fingers and toes to the alternating rhythm.

“Perfect,” he said, squeezing her hand again. “We’ll try this one a few more times then. Silence can be as important as the sound itself. This time focus on what you feel after the music stops.”

After multiple repetitions of the song, he finally asked her. “Tell me what you felt.” 

“Um...it’s familiar?” she said, trying to gesture with both hands. “Sorry, this is fun, but weird. I don’t think I have the right words to explain it.”

“Excellent. Then you’re on the right track,” he said.

She stared at him, only looking away when he began dissecting her expression in turn. ‘When did he get so encouraging? Why isn’t he already asleep?’

“If you don’t have words for it, that’s good. It means you’re not thinking in the same way,” he said, giving her pinky a small tug when she wouldn’t look back. “I mean it. Don’t be embarrassed.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” she said without the usual snark they traded in.

“You’re only struggling because the language part of your mind wants to label everything it thinks and sees, that slows it down.”

The look of skepticism she gave him was only a bit milder than the moue of impatience she made when she closed her eyes again to concentrate. “So I should just just stream of consciousness blabber so you know if I’m on the right track then?”

“I can’t think of a better way since you have the most pitiful growls I have ever heard.”

Her eyes flew open to glare at him, doubly angry that she couldn’t keep from smiling at his barb.

“Fine,” she said, closing her eyes again while he started the song once more. 

“It feels like a secret. A sad one. Like washes of blue watercolour paint, growing darker and darker. There! When you pause the track, it keeps drifting away like it’s being taken out by the tide until it's too faint to hear in my mind.”

“Anything else?”

“Mmm. I guess, it’s. It doesn’t make sense, but it’s somehow soft, and safe, but also scary and...grief?” she said, opening her eyes with annoyance. ‘Ugh. That sounded like gibberish.’

“Exactly as a hymn to Leviathan should sound. Although, this is the truncated version that was passed down as a lullaby," he said. "You’re actually quite good at this.”

She waited for him to say he was surprised. When nothing was forthcoming she rolled to face him. “Who are you and what have you done with my Belphegor?”

“Oh, I’m _your_ Belphegor now, am I?” he asked, a smug smile spreading over his face. “Well, you certainly have weird tastes don’t you.”

At first she thought he was mocking her again, but she recognized the words from somewhere. “Sorry, bud. You’re mine. You asked for it. And I quote ‘How would you like to make me yours?’”

“Are you so sure you wouldn’t like to be _mine_?” he asked, rolling to his side to face her. “It comes with quite a few perks, free bedwarmer included.”

‘That’s what it was. He’d said I had weird tastes because I went to find him the night we made the pact.’ She searched his face for any hint of chicanery. “Nah, clearly I should have made you into my own personal servant, and worked you like a slave.”

“Oh? What sort of absurd demands would you make of me?”

She didn’t take long to think about it. “I’d probably just make you teach me like this,” she said, as she avoided his eyes and their hypnotic effects. ‘I’d have you makeout with me again for one,’ she thought.

“Hmm,” he said, looking at her hand in his. “Well you get that anyway, so you should just be mine because you can. Besides, you’d look best in my colours.”

Covering her mouth with her free hand, she gave a very unladylike chortle. “Good luck with that. You’ll have to fight Asmo for rights to my closet. Besides, if I’m yours I bet that means you can wriggle out of our pact.” For a moment, she allowed herself to look sad in front of him, and she met his stare. “I’d relinquish it if you asked me to though.”

His eyes narrowed. "I'm used to being alone...I don't mind it, but if you’re rejecting me, you should say so plainly." 

“That’s not quite what I—”

“Command me to never relinquish our pact,” he said, as the pink in his eyes swirled to overpower the purple.

“Maybe I should go...You can send me some tracks to listen to and...I’ll figure it out,” she said, frowning.

"Hey,” he said, when she began to withdraw her hand from his. “I’m not bluffing. Besides, you can’t go. This lesson was the price for walking you around town. A deal’s a deal.” He rolled back to his supine position, staring at the ceiling of his old prison.

When he tugged at her hand again she returned to her listening station as well.

“Don’t go all quiet on me,” Belphegor said as he held up the controller again. Dropping it back down to his side, he looked to her once more. “I meant it when I said I wanted to be the closest demon to you, but, that’s not what we’re up here for today, so don’t worry about it right now.” 

She nodded, certain that he could see it this time. 

“Language and music are processed by filling in sounds and silences,” he said, continuing as if nothing had happened. “The words might deviate dramatically from previous associations or experiences, you may never have heard a sentence before, but you can instantly make sense of it. That is what we're aiming for. You need to feel the language to understand it."

“That sounds like it will take a while,” she said, her body suddenly remembering it’s aches and fatigue.

“You listen to Levi’s music all the time. You hear Mammon and Beel rumbling in their sleep. So you’ve heard it plenty. Now it’s just a matter of knowing how and what to look for.”

He knew he wouldn't be able to determine what made her sad or smile. Just like dreams, he didn't know the associations she held with sounds. A slow tempo, monotonous, and low pitches related to most as sad, but the wrong key, or a combination of notes, could just as easily remind her of throwing pine cones angrily, or sharing a happy duet with sad words.

With a click of a button he played something from Satan’s doom metal collection. Oddly, it seemed to please her as much as the classical music tracks. ‘It’s good to have her here,’ he thought, still off balance from her offer to break their pact. ‘This is where I was a prisoner, but it’s also the place I met her, where I saw her most often.’ 

Clicking through another few songs, he watched her reaction to the use of an Infernal scale. ‘She’s not convinced yet. Too skittish of me still. Not that I blame her. One lie is enough to question all truths after all, but this is the place that smells most like me, that is permeated with my magic, at least here she is focusing on me.” 

A new melody blanketed the room. “You should be able to hear similar themes in this, but they will have different meanings,” he said. “For example, you can be alone in the ocean, stranded. Or alone, waiting for a lover. A dark alley says I don't belong here; There's danger, but the lighting is the same as your bed where you can sleep unarmed and naked in the dark.” Momentarily he paused the track to check that she was following along. 

“Same but different, then?” 

“Exactly. Now, try to differentiate these three from one another.”

“Moving...No, sensual?”

“Mhmm,” he said, sitting up to raise and kiss her hand.

“Sunk, buried, below...Ah, no wait. Deep?”

“Very good,” he said, before sucking a finger into his mouth.

“Assertive?” she asked.

“Almost.”

“D-dominant...” she said, as her eyes opened and she breathed deeply.

“Well done,” he said, laying a chaste kiss to her palm, with a look that was anything but chaste. “It's psychological, but takes on a physical aspect in the material world, including sound.”

“It's like thinking in pictures and feelings,” she said, shyly, looking at the hand that he still hadn't yet released.

Watching her dazed expression, and fluttering lashes, he knew he wanted to play with her, teach her his favourite rhythms. He wanted to play heavy beats that would have her panting for him as the bass pulsated through her. She was already open to the air. He'd let the vibrations run up her legs before switching to delicate and sensual harmonies, something that implied intimacy while he fucked her roughly and kissed her softly.

Whether he spoke in her common tongue, whispered sweet Celestial words to her, or growled in Infernal, he wanted her mind to spin colours and emotions, and thrum with his words. He wanted her to bask in the sensations, and feelings he could give her. He wanted her to feel like she belonged when she was with him.

Instead, he nodded to her in response and released her hand. He turned off the music, but she still pressed her hands and feet flat on the floor, disoriented now without the sound and vibrations to sift.

“Your legs,” he said, sitting up to look at them with concern.

She sat up quickly and covered herself.

“I’ve slept with you. I assure you, your silky thighs have been seen by me before,” he said, as his cheeky smile appeared. “Slung over me a few times, in fact.” He kept his hands to himself, despite remembering the way she sauntered out of bed in only booty shorts not so long ago.

This time it was her turn to just nod. She looked uncomfortable.

“How’d you manage to get so banged up?” he asked, uninterested in mincing words. “Allergic reactions don’t tend to leave bite marks.”

She sighed. “It’s late, I should head out and get lunch before dance practice,” she said and rose, dusting herself off.

Standing just as quickly, he trapped her in his arms instead of letting her flee his questions. “I won’t ask any more,” he said.

Lust, and relief, and worry laced what she heard, but it was hard to tell if she was imagining that inflection, or if she was projecting it, hearing what she wanted to hear. Pushing away slightly, she looked at him while remaining alert and rising on her toes with uncertainty. “Say that again,” she said, her breathing shaky.

“I won’t take anything you don’t willingly give to me,” he said, and she realized, wide-eyed and giddy that she understood. He wasn’t speaking her language. He was speaking his! She crushed him to her in a hug, eyes brimming, overwhelmed as she tried to process the snippets of imagery and sensation. “Thank you,” she said, gasping in his ear.

Stroking her back, he waited for the alarm to fade into flustered excitement, and for it to calm into warmth. He’d expected her to take much longer to make the connections required, but it seemed he’d underestimated her. Happily underestimated her.

He kissed her gently, soothing her heart rate, and unhooking her arms from around his neck. “You should go get lunch,” he said, pushing them apart again, “before I toss you on my bed and teach you some new words.”

His smile made her stomach flip flop, and she scurried away with small, rapid steps towards the door.

He put his hands to the back of his head, flexing his arms and pointing his elbows up in success and victory, but also devising what he should do next as he watched her leave.

Releasing the breath he’d been holding, he realized he’d have to tell Beelzebub.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AO3 keeps telling me the wrong date for when I've updated this fiction and it's driving me crazy...
> 
> Also, please be sure to leave a comment <3 they encourage me to keep writing!


	35. Fried Batwing and Eavesdropping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leviathan overhears some things he's not yet meant to learn about.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

Fried batwing, it turned out, tasted very similar to crispy bacon. All she had to do was remove the hooked claw of the thumb, and it was just weird shaped bacon.

Thankfully, Satan had let her know that backstabbing sandwiches were essentially a standard BLT, something about tomatoes being forbidden and evil. Armed with that knowledge, she happily munched away on one she’d found in the fridge, content to stand and eat the unlabelled sandwich while soaking up the heat of the room through her bare feet. ‘I’ll have to go collect my stuff from the attic later if the Little Demons don’t before I get to it,’ she thought. ‘That or I’ll have Belphegor at my door trying to return them.’

Her time with Belphegor had been nice overall. Other than the brief moment in the middle where things had become serious, it had felt easy and comfortable, the same way she felt when Mammon fell asleep next to her. 

‘I really do them all a disservice when I reduce them down to just their sin,’she thought. ‘There’s so much more to them. Satan’s probably the most readily forgiving of all of them from what I’ve seen, in spite of his fury. Belphegor can keep himself awake to teach an in-depth workshop. Even Mammon bought me a present once.’ They were so much more than the armor they’d collected here in the Devildom.

It seemed she was being won over by each of them no matter how long she stalled. Thankfully, nothing had exploded. The house hadn’t cracked in half either. ‘Maybe this new normal, and touchiness will be okay?’ She could consider everyone’s feelings about leaving when that day drew closer. ‘Might as well enjoy today,’ she thought. It didn’t mean she was going to start wooing her demons, but at least she had shrugged off some of the feeling of impending doom attached to thoughts of cuddling too often, or exchanging small shows of affection.

Taking her sandwich to her bedroom, she locked the door behind her. She’d need to clean up the messy room after her lunch, and interlopers would not be welcome until at least the most obvious signs of her obscene night had been tidied away. ‘If I’m lucky, I might even have time for a short nap after,’ she thought.

* * *

Leviathan usually tried not to eavesdrop, especially not on Mammon. He didn’t want to lose any more brain cells than necessary. The shouting wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, except that he could also hear Satan answering, and he wasn’t yelling back.

“Whaddya mean you couldn’t find anything?” was the first thing he’d heard as he trekked down the hall.

Satan’s responses were too quiet, bringing Leviathan closer to the partially closed door, to crouch and listen at the hinges.

“Well, have you ever seen her exhibit any out of character bursts of sin, maybe greed?” Satan asked.

“Quit being stubborn and speak up,” Satan said, likely prodding Mammon after the lengthy pause.

“Only once when she stole Leviathan’s ice cream cone,” Mammon said, mumbling. “I could feel the swell of greed and she almost didn’t give it back to him.”

Leviathan was stunned! 'I knew it!' he thought. 'She really wasn't just playing! She was going to eat the whole thing if I let her!'

“Was that associated with anything, any incidents, work with me here.”

“Uhm pppfhhht. It was a warm flux day. She threatened to make Levi carry her there and back if he kept whining. I think she was home sick? That’s why we left the house, for human ice cream.”

'That's true. I caught her moping in the pool,’ Leviathan thought. She'd brought her phone charm from London into the pool with her to fiddle with. “Something familiar” she’d told him.

“Okay, so an emotion turned into a sin. Did it go away completely afterwards?”

“I didn’t notice it again, so yeah, I think so.”

‘What in the twenty-three levels are they talking about?’ Leviathan wondered, ‘and why? Breakfast was unusual, but petty revenge on Asmo is hardly a sin.’ He would ask her when she came to visit him for gaming tonight. 

‘I don’t think she’ll forget, but she was really unwell when I left last night. I’ll just remind her at dinner.’ He’d already tidied up early in case she stopped by before then.

“I found one source on a human with Celestial heritage, but it mostly talked about how they glowed faintly when in distress,” Satan said.

“Nope, none of that.”

“There was another that moved faster than humans should.”

“Definitely not. We got the slowest pick of the litter there.”

“And two that could learn to speak Celestial after a time.”

“Also not helpful.”

“Well, I don’t have any other explanation for her reaction. If it were just bruising we could assume we’re not careful enough with our handling of her during the day to day, but your observation of bite and nail marks indicate a more purposeful interaction.”

“Well no shit. That’s the problem.”

Leviathan could only imagine Satan pinching the bridge of his nose, while trying not to bludgeon Mammon with his notes.

“There are only four possibilities: She injured herself, Asmodeus marked her up, one of us aided her during her distress, or…and don’t jump to conclusions, we may not have guarded her as carefully as we needed to while on outings.”

“What are you saying?” Mammon asked, his voice low and deadly serious.

A shiver of fear raced up Leviathan’s spine at the tone. It wasn't often that Mammon used it. Not unless things were truly going wrong.

“They are all just possibilities,” Satan said, trying to placate him, “and some are much more plausible than others. For example, I doubt she’d be able to leave hickeys in a variety of areas you might have observed them in, right?”

“Yeah, so what?”

“So, that’s one we can strike off to narrow down the course of events.”

“Satan, we all visited her while she was sick…but you and I were never alone with her.”

The pumps in Leviathan’s head continued to churn thoughts, and swirl them together and apart like bubbles. ‘So, she wasn’t just sick,’ he thought. ‘It actually had something to do with her lineage, and getting hickeys, and she hasn’t told  _ me _ , her truest friend!’ It stung, but at least she hadn’t told them either.

Mammon broke the silence, “There’s no way it happened outside-a the house. She’s been home since she got sick, and she didn’t have those damn marks on her Saturday morning.”

“Which means Asmodeus, based on her threats towards him, or someone else, or both Asmodeus and someone else have been using her body as a canvas,” Satan said, trying to bypass any crassness.

‘Why wouldn’t she just tell me?’ Leviathan wondered, a cry of betrayal in his mind. His internal cry of indignation sounded precisely as Mammon voiced it behind the library doors.

“There could be any number of reasons…” Satan began to say.

But Leviathan had had enough. He stormed back the way he’d come, and thundered his way down the stairs to the basement, and the gym. ‘She should be there now, if not then I’ll demand she let me into her room for explanations. And If I get too nervous I’ll text her until her D.D.D. freezes from all the incoming messages!’ he thought.

He opened the door to the gym, and the pit of his stomach turned to a heavy lump of ice. He let the door fall silently closed again, walked back to his room, his tail dragging on each step of the stairs.

The click of the lock on his door as he sealed it was deafening to him.


	36. Temperance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beel tells MC how he feels under no uncertain terms.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

She considered changing into something more gym appropriate, but if it was just dancing, and helping Beelzebub maintain proper form, then the long skirt she was wearing wouldn’t be an issue. This was mostly ballroom dance and the like, not something that required her to show her knees, or paint yoga pants on to her ass.

At least in a skirt there’d be some air flow below the equator. It was almost two in the afternoon, but her body wasn’t shy about reminding her it had been thoroughly put through its paces recently, and tight pants and damp panties were not high on her list of priorities for the remainder of the day. The skirt would be fine until her body could figure out it wasn’t about to be thoroughly ravished at any moment.

Standing, she inspected her room; it was cleaner than before, but she kept looking for something else to fix or tidy away. She was dawdling. ‘I want to go practice for the party, but I’m not quite sure where Beel and I stand anymore,’ she thought. ‘Could I be any more childish right now? Deep breath.’ She fluffed her pillows again for the third time. ‘I’ve lived with the “Lords of Darkness” for months now, I can’t let a little bit of dancing scare me. I’m going to kick some ass today, even if it has to be my own!’

She strapped on an appropriate pair of dance shoes, and hurried down to the gym before she could talk herself out of it.

* * *

The door swung open silently, and Beelzebub didn’t look up until he heard her footsteps. “Good timing,” he said. “I just finished setting up the playlist.” He offered his hand and his smile to her, and she took them both blithely. ‘I’m glad she came,’ he thought. ‘I don’t know why I was worried.’

“I’m just glad to be breaking my always-late streak,” she said, taking the hand he held out to her.

Pulling her closer and into frame, Beelzebub led their start with a side hesitation, establishing neutral territory. 

Nothing seemed different, she realized as he stepped into her space. His body was a bit closer than at the last ball, his grasp under her shoulder blade only the slightest bit firmer, but otherwise, it seemed the same. ‘Still safe and comfortable,’ she thought, letting her mind drift. ‘I’m almost disappointed. He was a good kisser.’

Eventually, she noticed that he had been calling her name, slowing their steps to half the pace in order to gain her attention. “Sorry,” she said, “still a bit tired, I guess.”

“We can stop if you like. There’s always tomorrow,” he said, and his eyes were sincere, even if his body betrayed him, and held her closer.

“No, no. I’ll be fine. Promise. Just no weights for me today.”

He mumbled something under his breath, but it was too low for her to catch properly. She likely would have needed him to repeat it a few times anyways to understand the snippets of Infernal. Thankfully, he took her at her word, and once more she felt like she was floating. Other than holding her own arm up to avoid fatiguing him, not that it would ever be an issue with Beel, it felt as though it took no effort to move with him. ‘He might as well be carrying me,’ she thought.

“I know we never talked about it, but when you stepped in to shield me from Lucifer, I was pretty shocked,” he said, waiting only to ensure that she heard him. “I mean why would you go to those lengths? You’re not a demon or an angel, and you’re not even someone with powerful magic. You’re just a regular human.”

“It felt like the right thing to do.”

“You worked so hard to save Belphegor...”

She looked at him curiously as a faint burble accompanied his swallowing. ‘Did I just imagine that from his sound?’ she wondered. ‘It felt like “and I hope to make me smile?”’

Lifting her hand from his bicep, she brushed his hair away from his face. The orange looked far too good between her fingers. “I couldn’t have you looking so sad all the time,” she said, still debating whether she was learning new phrases correctly, or just imagining things.

The furtive and timid look he gave her boosted her confidence. ‘Maybe I can mess with Levi and convince him I do have telepathy…’

“I-I want you to know that you are very important to me,” he said, continuing when her hand returned to their prescribed frame. “Of course, Lucifer and Mammon, and the others are also important to me, but it's not the same. The way I feel about you is different. It’s sort of like… you’re more special to me. Do you understand what I’m trying to say?”

He looked so hopeful.

“I like you too, Beel,” she said. She wasn’t sure why she felt so shy. Was this really any different than it had been the day before last? Or even before that? These feelings hadn’t just appeared overnight. The attraction certainly hadn’t.

“Good,” he said, as the music changed. He rocked her weight into him, closing their embrace. “I was hoping that, if I hadn’t scared you away, you would save me the first dance at the party?”

“I’d like that,” she said, trying to pay attention to where her feet should be. Tango was not her strong suit. She lost her perception of the beat when one of her legs was halted by the steel of his thigh, only for her to be pushed back the way she’d come. Despite the quick movements, it was still smolderingly slow.

He released the hand at her back from the hold before immediately returning it, testing her balance. “You’re going to fall backwards if you keep looking down,” he said.

“I might fall if I keep looking up,” she said apologetically, her eyes flitting to meet his for only a moment. She really could lose herself in his eyes. ‘If I want to stay upright I might just be better off with my eyes closed.’

They’d stopped, she realized. He’d dropped his hand lower, and lifted her by the waist, his other hand cupping her face. It felt like he was staring into her soul.

“You can touch me. I don't mind," he said shyly, as if he weren’t already holding her aloft.

This time she kissed him rather than ask for another. Her hands were in his hair, pressing her bruised lips hard to his, deepening the kiss with urgency, not allowing him the slow gentle pace of before. “How can you be so utterly gorgeous and yet so cute,” she asked, breathing the question against his mouth when they broke apart. His eyes glazed over as she leaned in to leave small wet kisses along his neck. “I love the way you flush when I touch you like this,” she said, drawing her hand down the other side of his neck to the peak of his chest.

He sunk to his knees, and set her gently on her feet, arms settling around her hips. His heart kept missing beats. His hands couldn't bring her close enough. Tasting her, he realized he'd been starving.

He wasn’t that much shorter than her even like this, but she didn’t mind, it made it easier to apply pressure to their kisses when she was above him. “I think I will eat you slowly with kisses,” she said, whispering to him as she traced his collarbone with her cool fingertips.

He groaned at her words, and his arms around her hips embraced her more tightly.

The barest flinch from her, and he was ten feet away faster than she could blink. How he’d seen her reaction with his eyes closed she wasn’t sure.

“Beel, why are you all the way over there?” she asked, concerned. ‘He didn’t run away when he was in my bed, or when he kissed me on the workout bench. What’s going on? Did I do something wrong?’

“I’m sorry, I just don’t want to hurt you.”

She stalked over to him, and took his placating hands in hers, wrapping them back around her. “If you don’t want to hurt me, then don’t run away from my kisses,” she said, trying to remain playful. This time she kissed him slowly, gently, easing him back into their mutual appreciation.

The rumbling growl that left him when her tongue met the edge of his jaw made her shiver, and he paused again. “I’ll let you know if you’re too rough. Now stop coddling me, and manhandle me,” she said. “I miss the warmth of you.”

Tentatively, Beelzebub’s hands began moving again, tracing along her hip, and gently over her arm. 

“Beel?” she asked. “You didn’t seem to mind when I kissed you before. Why are you being so shy with me now?”

“I-I just don’t want to…”

“Hurt me,” she said. “Yes, I understand that, but you’ve never hurt me before.” She pressed her lips briefly to his, and his hands slid softly over the backs of her thighs.

Hugging her to him, Beelzebub nuzzled against her bosom, and hid his face.

‘The Devildom never makes sense,’ she thought. More confused than patient, she waited until he mumbled an explanation into her chest.

"I can't hear you, Beel, what is it that you want?" she asked, drawing him up to look at her, with her hands on either side of his face. She hadn’t thought it was possible for him to blush harder than before, but it seemed her breasts could stain him an even darker shade of red.

“I usually only think of food, but that doesn’t mean you don’t make my mouth water,” he said, his words barely above a whisper. “I’ve been trying so hard to temper my want for you, but I just…” He swallowed hard and she felt his arms and hands flex around her.

“I want you too.”

That was all he needed. He moved her as carefully as he had when he’d run with her to Hattusa, and she was on the floor and under him in seconds. “I can’t stop thinking about ripping your clothes off and tasting all of you,” he said, lips and teeth bumping her shoulder, before murmuring more words of need into her exposed neck.

It was easy to forget how much bigger than her he was by how easily she cowed him, but now, it was obvious as he completely blocked her view of the lights overhead.

He licked at the spot on her collarbone that had earned him the lowest sounds last time, and she didn’t disappoint. The sound did nothing to satiate him, inciting his need to taste more of her instead.

“Beel,” she said, “someone will see.”

“No one will see,” he said, his words a promise. “We’re the only two who use this room.”

Her hands dragged his shirt up to run her nails over his muscled stomach.

The look she was giving him, with little else, would have been enough to tip him over the edge if he hadn’t relieved some tension earlier. It was still enough to make him shift forms when he dragged his thumb over one of her hardened nipples and heard her gasp. The sound, and the way she pressed herself further into his hand, broke what little concentration he had maintained.

“Better,” she said when she could see the silhouette of his wings.

His mouth watered as he hovered over her on his hands and knees, soaking in that one word that was filled with approval and authority he craved.

She reached for him and he held her hand to his mouth, kissing at every bit of flesh he could reach. “Let me worship you,” he said, imploring her as his mouth reached the soft flesh of her elbow. He could see her debating, watched as the thoughts played across her face. Returning her arm to her, he brought himself low, grazing his chest against hers, and kissing softly along her throat.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather I play with you instead?” she asked. ‘I’m not sure how he’ll react to the marks under my clothes.’ She'd intended to keep her clothing on while she made him melt into a puddle of giant, soft demon.

“You are the sweetest feeling I know,” he said, his breath hot against her neck.

‘He wouldn’t withstand what I had in mind before if he’s this close to begging just to touch me.’

“Let me take care of you?” he asked, the question plaintive and needy. He tugged down the neckline of her shirt, and pressed his mouth over her small wounds.

“Beel…” she said, second guessing the intelligence of revealing herself to him while covered in another demon’s marks.

He slid his tongue lower into her shirt, and she squirmed as his tongue swiped closer and closer to her nipple.

“I already know,” he said, as he tugged both her shirt and bra the rest of the way down, freeing her breasts to his roving tongue and the cool air of the room. “I don’t care, just let me tend upon you.

She felt her trepidation falling away as he kissed everywhere that he could reach. Nothing held her in place other than his veneration and request. ‘Somehow he already knew,’ she thought. ‘Was I that obvious? At least he isn’t jealous or upset.’ His mouth scattered her thoughts. ‘Why not? Just this once.’ She charged him with only one word, “More.”

As if she’d lashed him, he jumped to work, straddling her before he brought his hands to the center of her shirt and bra, tearing them in half like tissue paper. 

He brushed his hands down her chest, warming her, letting his fingers trail over her. When she closed her eyes, he did it again with one outstretched hand, still managing to brush against both her nipples. Replacing his fingertips with his tongue, he traced the same paths while he dealt with the remnants of her covering.

The sound of her sleeves and straps tearing were short-lived, and he swept their remains off of her, like bits of cobweb, before returning to torturing her with his mouth. Every bruise he kissed, every set of fingerprints he shadowed, every lave of his tongue felt better, less painful under his care.

She didn’t think her body would forgive her for another demonic round, no matter how sweet, but the heat coiled in her belly wouldn’t allow her to push him away. Her grasp in his hair steadied her as she felt the zip of her skirt slide down.

“Take this off,” she said, tugging on his shirt, and he stopped for the barest moment to appease her. Whether he was that fast at disrobing, or he just tore the shirt and jacket away, she wasn’t sure, but she didn’t let her mind fixate on it, too busy enjoying the masterpiece he’d revealed. 

“To be honest, I’ve always wanted to do this,” he said, hiding his words within his kisses along her stomach, “but you’ve always had at least one or two of my brothers hanging around you.” His slurped noisily over her hip bone, and felt her body rise to meet him. 

“I didn’t realize,” she said, concentrating on her breathing, and slowing her greedy hands. ‘I’ll drag him back to where I can reach him properly soon enough,’ she thought. 

Her hips already raised, and Beelzebub easily balanced her weight in his hands, cupping her ass as he lifted her closer to his mouth.

She did her best not to push herself closer, trying to go at his pace instead.

“I felt like it wouldn’t be right for me to steal you away from them, and hog all of your attention,” he said, dragging her skirt lower with his teeth, “but just this once, it’s okay if I have you all to myself, right?”

“Yessss,” she said, her hands still trying to reach for him.’So, close to where I want him. His breath is so warm.’ She’d imagined him like this more times than was probably healthy, and she was desperate to see how he compared to her imagination.

Lowering her back to the floor, with steady control, until he could slowly drag the skirt down her thighs, Beelzebub gradually exposed her to him.

She heard the intake of breath when he didn’t find an additional layer beneath her skirt, but it didn’t slow him from the worship he’d chosen. “I need your body pressed against mine soon,” he said, his voice husky with desire. 

Moving lower, he sucked on the dark hickeys of her inner thighs, and despite his warning, every time she got too close to touching him, he would lift her hips, forcing her to fall back.

Tugging her closer, he brought her knees to his mouth, and set her ass in his lap. “Your skin is always too cool,” he said as he kissed the insides of her knees. “It makes me worry.”

She wasn’t sure what to say to that. Her mind was still fogged from how he’d nipped at her thighs. Tilted downward on her own inclined plane, she reached for him, and was finally rewarded with the warmth of his legs under her palms.

Bending her knees closer to her chest, he nuzzled against her calves. “Your scent is always everywhere. It’s maddening,” he said, as he continued to fold her in on herself.

“Too often I imagine your fingers wrapped around me,” he said, sealing the words into the bruises on her ankles, and drawing his pinky finger between the arch of her foot and her strapped high heels.

“The taste of your kiss is something that has haunted me,” he said, whispering it to her skin as he moved back up her legs. “First in my imagination, and then in my memories.”

“Beel?” she asked, her fingers digging into his muscular thighs under her.

“I need you,” he said, barely getting the words out, before he grabbed her hips, and raised her to his tongue.

She should have known that she would never be able to withstand the hunger of the Avatar of Gluttony. He devoured her in a way she’d never experienced before. If this was the result of his forbearance, she’d make him wait every time

Her hands scrabbled at nothing on the bare floor, while his grip held her hips immobile. “Fuck. So good.” she said, as she tried to stifle her moans. His tongue delved and lapped against her without reprieve.

The goosebumps on her legs interrupted his feasting, and he relented only long enough to draw her legs over his shoulders, freeing a hand to stroke warmth back into her skin while still holding her up with the other. 

Just as she thought she’d have a chance to catch her breath, he sucked lightly on her clit, drawing his hand back to her thigh to keep her from tensing her legs around his head.

“Tell me you want me,” he said, stilling so that only she moved, or attempted to, while his hands held her legs apart.

“I—” 

He lazily dragged his tongue over her again.

“Ah!” She felt him hum against her clit and couldn’t help but try to buck against his mouth. Her eyes finally met his, and she could see his devious smirk between her legs. She’d misjudged him as well. Her sweet, patient Beel, had tricked her momentarily; He was impatient and voracious. “I want you,” she said, gasping as his mouth returned to her clit. “Hold me down. Use your tongue. Make me moan. Don't stop until I'm shaking!”

The press of his finger against her entrance had her trying to wriggle from his grasp, it was already too much. “Kiss me,” she demanded breathlessly.

He was over top of her quickly, and she luxuriated in the heat of his skin near again. Finally, she could touch him. She ran her hands over his back, smoothing her fingertips down the tops of his wings as she took the pace of their kiss for herself. ‘I want to be touching all of him. I want all of him,’ she thought, growing impatient despite the soft cries he drew from her with each short thrust of his finger, and press of his thumb.

“Another,” she said, rolling her hips up to meet him. Her hands brushed against his bent knees at her hips, and she tried to hold on to them.

She watched his face as he slowly inserted a second finger inside her. It looked like bliss and torture.

‘I was an angel of temperance and composure once,’ he thought, as she sucked his second finger into her wet heat. ‘I can wait. I can wait until she…’ The noises she made while she fucked herself on his hand were going to be his undoing.

Finally, fully immersed, he beckoned her with a curl and drag of those two fingers, only uncurling to push back in and let his thumb press against her clit. “I want to be the first thing you touch in the morning and the last thing you taste at night,” he said, crooning the words in her ear.

He could see she was close. He watched her body tense and shake, felt her squeezing around his fingers. Slowly, he pressed in a third finger, holding her body in place with his own.

“Beel!” she squealed, edging away. “Your fingers are huge!” It only served to press her sensitive chest against the heat of his body, and her thighs spread further apart, feeling the stretch and instinctively moving, hoping to accommodate him.

She felt his smile on the shell of her ear, teeth bare against the cartilage. His chuckle rippled through her. “You definitely won’t fit me if I don’t.” Her whole body strained against him as her mouth opened in a silent cry.

“I don't think you understand, exactly, how much I want you,” he whispered in her hair as he watched her come. The way her walls fluttered around his fingers made him feel heady, and he would draw it out as long as possible.

Her strained breathing began to even out, and he could feel her finally relaxing around his fingers, despite the occasional twitch. Withdrawing his hand, he cleaned her come from it with his mouth.

Bliss bare for her to see, he lapped up the evidence of her pleasure. She watched him in awe and shivered, whether in cold, or lingering lust, she wasn’t sure. The growls he made moved through the room in shades of rapture.

When he finally looked at her again, he spoke with difficulty. “If you want to stop, we can,” he said, even as she saw him trembling over her. “This can be enough for me.”

She drew him closer. “Kiss me again,” she said, and he was on her, ravenous. Tasting every corner of her mouth that he could.

The kiss never seemed to end, and she took his hands in hers, and raised them above her head, asking him to hold her there against the floor. He only needed one hand to keep her there, using the other to unbuckle his belt, while his eyes searched hers for permission.

He found it in the way she met his gaze, biting her lip, and arching her back when she finally heard a button pop open.

She wouldn’t beg him, she wouldn’t need to. ‘I’ve been so stupid,,’ she thought. ‘I’ve been looking for a prince charming when I should have been trying to find this wolf in sheep's clothing.’ He was so soft and sweet on the outside, but he could see her better, hear her better, and eat her better than what she’d ever imagined.

“Fuck,” she said as the head of his cock bumped against her folds. She’d been wet this morning, but apparently her body had a weather forecast it had come prepared to fulfill; She could feel herself leaking arousal onto the floor.

The sound was obscene as he collected her juices, and coated his shaft in it, but there was no time to be embarrassed as he pushed into her. It was all she could do to stay quiet, and a poor job at that she did.

“I’m only halfway in,” he said, his deep voice strained in her ear, “but if you keep making those sounds, I might not make it much further.”

“More,” she said, shimmying her hips against him. His free hand immediately shot down to hold her pelvis in place as he panted.

“You’re a cruel woman,” he said, muttering the words into her neck, still keeping her hands stretched above her.

“You have no idea.” Her words barely came out as a hiss.

The moment he stilled, fully seated in her, she heard him groan nearly low enough to be a growl. She tapped her fingers lightly against his hand and he released her wrists.

“Tell me I can move?” he asked, trying to breathe through his need.

“Let me sit in your lap so I can take you deeper.”

He shook from the want she inspired with her words. There was no way for her to understand the words he growled to her but he said them anyway as he moved to sit them upright.

She clenched and spasmed around the sensation. ‘He’s practically a vibrator when he growls and shakes at the same time,’ she thought.

Having remained seated inside as he lifted her, she was quick to wrap her legs around him without further adjustment. She kissed him again, slowly, as she pressed herself further down on to him. The sensation of him bottoming out within her had her arching her chest against the hard planes of his body. “Now, fuck me,” she said.

Hesitantly, he obliged, slowly at first, and then lifting her up with his strength to bring her back down on to him with greater speed and force. He knew he wouldn’t last long. Not after the last few days. Not with her painfully tight around him. Already, his pace was stuttering. She was clinging to him, stealing kisses from him until he could barely breathe.

He came before he could ask. The way she said his name broke his resolve and he emptied himself inside her, kissing everywhere he could reach between gasps. Holding her there against him, inside her, he realized she’d been stroking his hair for some time.

Rumbling sleepily, Beelzebub nuzzled against her cheek with a satisfaction he couldn’t remember having felt in millennia. When she tightened around him again, his hips jerked upward instinctively.

She had seen the thought in his happy growl. ‘You taste like I belong on my knees.’ It was impossible not to flex around him when he broadcast thoughts like that. “Insatiable demon,” she said, laughing quietly.

Wanting to steal her away and indulge in her more, Beelzebub didn’t want to release her.

“We should get dressed,” she said, instead of commenting on his low grumbles.

She smiled when he growled without any meaning, just a huff of discontent at the thought of clothing. She slid off his lap to find her skirt.

Shredded clothing in his hand, he mopped up their combined pleasure as it leaked from her, not allowing her to leave his side until he was done wiping and kissing her clean.

She moved the short distance to collect and shimmy into her skirt. It was a surprise when she felt Beelzebub’s parka slide over her shoulders. Only the smallest of kisses delayed him as he walked around her to zip her into it, hiding her body from any prying eyes.

“Don’t worry,” he said, as she looked to the exit. “You can’t ruin friendship with sex. That’s like trying to ruin ice cream with chocolate sprinkles.”

She laughed harder than she should have at that. ‘Trust him to figure out my preoccupation even before my brain has kicked back in fully.’

An overwhelming urge to carry her back to his room welled up in Beelzebub, but he relented and walked her back to her room instead, stealing kisses from her as he led her up the stairwell.


	37. Common Cause

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Math
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

“How bad was it?” Belphegor asked from his bed.

Beelzebub closed the door to their room behind him, wiping the dopey smile from his face. He grimaced.

“That bad?”

Despite the arms folded behind Belphegor's head, and his nonplussed expression, it was obvious to Beelzebub that his grimace hadn’t relaxed Belphegor in the slightest. “Worse than you described.”

“Asmodeus or unknown competition then,” Belphegor said to the ceiling. “We’ll have to step it up.” 

He heard Beelzebub rummage for a change of clothes. “Beel?” Belphegor asked, calling quietly, as Beelzebub walked past, towards their stairs. “Thanks.”

Stopping only briefly to nod his recognition, Beelzebub continued toward his bathroom.

As much as they were both vying for her affections, in this at least, they had an accord.

When he was sure Beelzebub had left, and was deafened by his shower, Belphegor rolled onto his stomach, flattened his pillow over his head, and growled his frustration into the mattress.

* * *

Beelzebub sighed happily as he stepped into the shower. If the water temperature was hot or cold he didn’t notice. For the first time that he could remember, he felt full. ‘‘She said she likes me!’ Other than the small ache that was Belphegor, he was overwhelmed with his own triumph. ‘Fuck, she let me touch her and hold her.’

The elation fell away, and rose again just as quickly, rising and falling as his thoughts circled.

‘Judging by how she responded to Asmodeus this morning, she won't want the whole house to know,’ he thought, reluctantly scrubbing away her scent. ‘But the way she smiled at me...And she kissed me first...Maybe she wouldn’t mind everyone knowing?’

He stood still under the water, no longer scrubbing. The marks on her had been heavy and it had hurt him physically to see it, but she’d still trusted him enough to let him under her clothes. ‘Her skin was layered in abuse. How could anyone—’ He shook his head. ‘It would be so much easier to protect her from pain like that if she could just accept us both.’

Leaning against the wall, Beelzebub considered how he'd come to pit himself against the other half of his heart. Sharing didn’t come easily to them, even if their hugs were frequent after they’d been apart. Sharing snacks, when he could manage it, created a layer of peace between them, but it was always difficult. Difficult but worth it to, when it showed Belphegor how much he was loved. 'That sort of sharing brings more happiness than distress to our bond; if only everything else were so easily shared.’

Even their room was shared but not: separate beds, separate decorations, separate chairs, separate colours and pictures, separate bathrooms, separate sleep schedules, separate everything else. They would come together if need, or emotions, were too much, but that was no longer enough right now. ‘Why can’t she love us both?’ he wondered. ‘Human traditions are so backwards.’ 

Beelzebub thought back as he washed and rinsed his hair. Working together to heal her injuries despite their competition, things like that were rare because they shared everything else in their lives: their creation, their emotions, their duties, occasionally their bodies. All else had to be separate for them to have any semblance of individuality. They guarded it possessively even though they never wanted to be apart.

It was an unspoken rule that didn’t ask for anything from one another unless they needed it, so it was always given willingly: clothing, naps, the last cupcake, war. The only other times they’d “united for a common cause,” as Belphegor called, was during the great fall, and then later during the insurrections. But, in this, they seemed to be at a stalemate.

Realizing that the water was in fact cold, Beelzebub turned the knob, and changed the temperature. He noticed he’d begun duplicating the sour anger that was practically Belphegor without form, and he worked to break the spell of churlishness. ‘I can’t solve the mystery of her injuries while I’m in the shower. There’s no point in letting it drag me down right now. This moment should be celebratory not sad.’ He tipped his head under the warming water and smiled. ‘She likes me too. She said so!’

His brother had his perpetual compassion, even though the additional emotions constantly disturbed his own composure, but he wouldn’t let someone else’s discontent, not even Belphegor's, destroy this moment. 

Shutting off the flow of water, the memory of her orders while he’d pleasured her flooded his mind, destroying the last of his preoccupation. ‘At any time she could have sent me away,’ he thought, remembering her breathlessness.

With how much she had been hurting before, he’d been worried that he’d only injure her further. ‘She trusted me though, wanted me.’ He tried to ignore his returning arousal as he recalled how she’d commanded him easily, even without using their pact.

‘I want to hear those words again, forever,’ he thought, as he let the recollection continue to bring him peace from his hunger.

As he toweled himself off, he circled back to how she would want to proceed, and tried to imagine whether she would like the cantaloupe coloured paint of his bathroom, or if she would prefer her glow lamps to his candles. ‘Next time, I’ll definitely bring her here to clean up together.’

Not even for Belphegor would he temper his elation today.


	38. Plans of Action and Distraction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC tries to take a time out.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MASSIVE thank you to Dalektable for their help in proof reading this and the next few chapters <3

A bubble bath: that was the next plan of action.

The door was locked, remaining clothing in hamper, bubbles tall, with steam condensating on every surface. This was exactly what she needed right now.

The day wasn’t even half over and she’d trudged to town and back, yelled at the apothecary, been bombarded by sound and emotion… been elated with Belphegor, and clung to him when she could finally hear him properly.

She blushed and stepped into the bath, letting the bubbles tower over and hide her, when she remembered her hasty retreat.She could tell Lucifer she would beat him to death with his own disembodied arms, but Belphegor said he wanted her and she flew from the room. He’d recommended it, but still…

The sound of her lock turning in the door was loud in the silence. There was no music this time, only the sound of bubbles slowly popping.

“Hello?” she called out. There was no way to see out of the bathroom to who was there.

“Oh there you are, darling~”

‘Asmodeus.’ His speech was easily recognizable. She wondered if he sounded as cute and euphonic in Infernal. ‘His voice probably felt like rainbows in Celestial,’ she joked to herself.

He swaggered into her bathroom without a care.

She considered using the pact to toss him out. She was supposed to be upset with him still, but it was hard to remember to hold a grudge against him when she still felt tingly and relaxed.

“How did you get in my room?” she asked, instead of telling him to go find Cerberus.

He transformed and waggled his pointed tail at her. Of course it could pick locks. It would be that dextrous.

She stared at him expectantly. She blinked and he had returned to his normal attire, rolling his pant legs up and discarding his socks.

He stepped into her bath water and sat himself on the ledge. “I came to cuddle and apologize,” he said, affecting a sad pout, “but it seems you’re not yet available for cuddles unless…”

“Good demons earn cuddles,” she said sternly, but she couldn’t keep the smile from her face.

“I forgive you. This time.” she specified. “There won’t be a next time.”

“You’re right,” he said solemnly as he paddled his feet in the water, “next time I’ll be much more careful with my suggestions.”

She wanted to dunk herself until he left. Impossible demon!

But then the gears in her mind finally began to catch and turn with one another instead of spinning aimlessly without traction.  
‘Maybe this actually was a demon-human misunderstanding…’

The look she gave him, studying and suspicious, was a surprise and he stopped paddling.

“Asmo, tell me a suggestion that you think I need to follow to be safe,” she said as a command, enforcing their pact.

“You should --”

“Stop!” she halted him, her hand raised above the mass of bubbles, “Say it in Infernal, closer to me.”

His expression told her he thought she had hit her head but he scooted closer to her bubble prison.

The gurgling sound he made wasn’t entirely discordant. ‘It still sounded like something that would come from Asmodeus,’ she thought, trying to sift through the layers she heard.

“Again,” she said with little force behind it.

He seemed anxious when he spoke the phrase again.

“Once more?” It was a question this time and not a command. She watched his face as he said it.

“AHA!” she said as she stood, rocketing out of the water and grabbing him by his shirt to stand fully in the water too. “You beautiful LUNKHEAD!”

His hands windmilled before they found her arms. She was still shrouded in sliding bubbles.

“This was not the type of cuddling I expected…” he started.

“Asmo,” she said, placing her hands on his cheeks and stretching the skin, “You pretty idiot, that does not mean ‘suggestion’ in my language. You meant direction, instruction, directive, or any other word like order.”

She could see he was actually growing angry at the abuse of his skin and she smoothed the pinches with her thumbs instead.

He pressed his cheek against her bubble-less one with ease. The small difference in their heights minor. “I will be more careful next time,” he promised.

She huffed, and tried to dispel all the raucous feelings he’d pulled back to the surface from her relaxed bath.

“You get a punishment then,” she said, and he looked nervous, “I’m in charge of dinner tonight. Would you prepare my mise en place for me?”

He kissed her, sweetly, with bubbles catching in his hair. It was unhurried and deliberate. His hands never left the curve of her shoulders. When he pulled away, he answered “Happily.”

She watched him sit again on the ledge and gracefully dismount. He turned the hot water on for her and with a smile he was gone, her bathroom door closed behind him and his socks missing from her floor.

* * *

Eventually, she shut the tap off, fully ensconced in heat and bubbles once more.

And there was a knock. Of course there was a knock. There was always a knock. This time she did submerge herself letting out her sardonic and incredulous laughter as a bubbling of air into the water.

She heard soft footsteps when she re-emerged. Someone must have come in when she didn’t answer. There was a knock on the bathroom door and Satan’s voice asked if she was in there.

“Satan,” she asked tiredly, “why are you trying to discern if I am bathing?”

She heard him moving, and then the door pressed against the latch ever so slightly. He’d sat down against the door, she realized.

“I came to check on you,” he said matter of factly. “Are you feeling any better after yesterday?”

She had momentarily forgotten in the general pandemonium that he had said out loud he wanted her while she was busy swooning for him… well, unconscious, but close enough. She wanted to dunk herself again. There was such a thing as too much attention.

“I’m feeling better,” she said, keeping her voice even and grateful. “Thank you for asking.”

“Of course,” he said, as if nothing could have possibly been done otherwise.

When nothing was forthcoming from her side except for a slosh of water, he continued, “I was originally coming to remind you that you’re on dinner duty tonight, but I passed Asmodeus in the kitchen.”

“Yes, I asked him to do the prep work and set up for me so I could lounge in here instead,” she said without shame.

“Well, he’s sockless - and partially wet everywhere - and dripping all over the kitchen. When asked, he said you pulled him into the tub with him.”

Ah there it was, the real “are you okay?”

True mirthful laughter erupted from her and echoed around the room, only dampened by the few tropical plants that crept throughout the humid room. “Well, I suppose I did,” she admitted, “but not in the way he likely made it sound.”

“That is reassuring to hear,” he said through the door, “I was--Mammon and I were worried that you might have some residual effects lingering.”

He heard her sigh.

“No,” she assured him, “I definitely don’t feel like that any more. Certainly not in any danger of spontaneously combusting either.”

“Glad to hear it.”

“Satan,” she said, her voice trying not to pose a question, “Thank you for not… Thank you for being so reasonable when I couldn’t be.” She was glad he was on the other side of the door. She didn’t need him to see her feelings of confusion and guilt.

“Well, I never thought I’d hear a woman say thank you for not having animalistic sex with me, but I also never thought I’d take that as a compliment either.”

She laughed again and splashed water on her face.

“I’m not sure what to do,” she confided in her confessor.

“There are only three options:” he said, “Continue as you are as if nothing happened, confess your undying love for one of us, or see which of us can put up with one another to share your affection,which is also very similar to continuing as if nothing happened.”

She sputtered on the water that had been at mouth level.

“Satan! You’re as bad as Solomon!”

“I will take that as a complimentary comparison of one learned gentleman to another,” he said.

“Don’t take it so seriously,” he cautioned her, “You’ll only drive yourself to distraction.”

“I thought distraction already was the problem.”

“Am I such a terrible distraction?”

“Only when you’re knowledgeable or holding a cat!”

There was silence from the other side of the door.

She worried her lower lip with the nail of her thumb, realizing she’d said it out loud. It wasn’t just a theory in an old notebook now. It wasn’t something she hadn’t heard. It was something she’d confirmed with more than the touch of fingertips.

“I am happy to hear that,” he said softly, almost too softly for her to hear. The sound of weight leaving the door signalled that he was standing, “But, I shall leave you to your bath and see you at dinner.”

She melted back into the bath water when she heard the outer door to her room click shut. Days without the structure of R.A.D. were always so much longer and hectic.


	39. False Calm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A calm ending to the day's antics.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

She hadn’t had the time or brain capacity to inspect her “battle scars” again. The mirrors were all fogged and her brain well-cooked from the bath. At least the soak had helped.

It was unlikely she’d be able to avoid Mammon’s needy cuddles tonight after he’d seen the bruises but maybe she would trace them before sleep once he had nodded off.

What she noticed of her arms and legs was auspicious; some things were clearly healing and fading. She wasn’t nearly as sore as she shimmied into another concealing outfit.

Dinner wasn’t trying. With all of the prep work done it was only a matter of heating, mixing, and plating.

Asmodeus had returned to his normal light-hearted coquetry. Satan made no mention of their conversations, only easy dinner talk and Lucifer excused himself quickly to work on something for Diavolo.

It almost seemed too easy after the constant stimulus-instinct pattern of the last few days. It was good to be able to breathe and think before reacting.

She hadn’t seen Mammon since breakfast though, and when he placed his hand on her thigh mid-meal she nearly jabbed him in the ribs with her bony fingers. No one seemed to notice, and he acted as if he weren’t rubbing soft circles on her leg with his thumb. It didn’t go beyond that, so she tucked in to her meal, letting her leg relax under his worried hand.

Leviathan was missing. Satan had messaged him, but was told not to expect him.  
‘It isn’t completely unusual,’ she thought. She told herself ‘He’s likely caught up in a new series. I’ll hear about it soon.’ She could check on him in the morning. He had enough rations to last weeks without having to visit the kitchen anyways.

But it was very hard to ignore the near constant stare down going on to her left. Sure, they would glance away occasionally, but Beelzebub and Belphegor had decided to take turns giving one another sour looks.

‘This time the get along shirt would definitely not be enough,’ she thought, kicking herself.

Mammon helped her clear the table, and dried dishes without complaint while she washed them. It was nice to have him working alongside her for something that wasn’t scheme related.

He even managed to avoid calling her a weak human for long enough that she let him try her first test batch of chocolates. She cleaned up her own chocolate mess after she kicked him out of the kitchen for saying they “weren’t bad for a human.”

It was early, but she decided sleep was in order, and there would likely be no one in her room this soon after supper. She’d be able to sleep like a rock.

Her moue of impatience could not have been any more noticeable when she opened the door and already her bed was covered in demon.

Belphegor was obviously already asleep but Mammon had been caught about to stick his hand in Belphegor’s mouth when she walked in. These two!

She rolled her eyes. Well, if they wanted to stay tonight, then so be it. They’d both been behaving well; she didn’t have any definite reason to kick them out. They’d been thoughtful today.

Modest pajamas collected, she gave Mammon the eye and motioned for him to turn away. He may have had an eyeful this morning, but that didn’t mean she would give up privacy in her own room.

She messaged Leviathan before she sped through her nightly routine. She wanted him to know that she missed him at dinner. She’d hoped to grind a few levels with him tonight for the raid tomorrow, but she was just too tired.

Wedging herself between her two bed-hogging demons she thought 'Maybe I should ask for a bigger bed.'

* * *

Mammon had moved off the bed to let her in and tried to let go of the fact that Belphegor had taken his spot near the wall. As the older brother he should have first dibs!

‘Not that calling “first” has worked out in any way so far,’ he thought as he slipped under the covers after her.

They hadn’t danced around one another tonight. Even on nights where she was exceptionally tired, they had always fallen asleep apart and then gravitated towards one another, or he had fallen asleep in her lap as she pet his head, only moving when he had to, keeping his arms around her hips.

He liked this new tradition where she reached for him and snuggled her face into his chest.

Listening as her breathing evened out, and the arm around his waist went slack, he nuzzled the top of her head, and left a small kiss before he drifted off as well. There would be time to ask questions later.


	40. Earning Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor is quite certain Mammon is asleep. That doesn't mean their human has to be.
> 
> Day 44, Monday, February 13th

Belphegor opened his eyes once he was able to dip into Mammon’s dream state. When it no longer lurched under his touch he knew the sleep was deep enough that he wouldn’t wake from small noises.

She was so close and he ached for her. It physically hurt after today to have her so near and not touch her.

Reaching out a hand he dragged a finger down her spine. She wiggled slightly and he repeated the motion. He didn’t like how she rolled her body against Mammon in response though.

His hand skimmed more of her side after he pushed the blankets away, petting her over the slippery fabric of her bed clothes. It was almost possible for him to pinpoint the moment she woke: when she shifted her torso so that his delicate touch pressed more firmly against her ribs.

She rolled over, looking at him. He realized Mammon had forgotten to extinguish the glow lanterns when her eyes showed comprehension. He was so used to her not being able to see him in the dark. It reminded him of how she had caught him peeping in her dream.

His outstretched hand was collected and brought into the cocoon of her arms and chest, followed promptly by sleepy murmurs. What a sight he must make, stretched out so that his arm could be used as a plushie.

It was no matter, she wasn’t fully asleep yet; he used her grip on him to pull her closer. Her eyelashes fluttered open again as she moved, unwilling to let go of his hand.

That was something at least.

Her sleeve fell down her arm as he moved to free his hand and he sat up to both marvel and curse the unblemished skin there.

“I both love and hate that Beel did such a thorough job,” he whispered to her, working to keep the sickness of his jealousy from his voice.

Her brow furrowed in confusion and he propped himself up with his elbow, resting his head in hand to more easily pull the sleeve to bunch further down her arm.

“Had you really not noticed?” he asked.

She was looking at her arm now too, instead of his bare chest, something that had greatly annoyed Mammon. 

The nail marks she’d shown Beelzebub at Hattusa were gone from her bicep, and most of the soreness abated.

“He’s the only one of us that managed to keep any semblance of healing ability,” he whispered, releasing her arm and reaching for the top button of her shirt.

Her hand covered his quickly as the button slid from the hole.

He raised an eyebrow and the pressure of her hand lessened enough for him to slip lower to the next button, and the next, until he was sure it would pool around her if he nudged her hand away.

“You wouldn’t begrudge me reviewing his handywork, now would you?”

She watched mesmerized as his tongue ran slowly along the underside of his upper lip.

“I wouldn’t want you to think I would let you stay in that state,” he said, drawing her hand away and to his lips. He loved the way her pulse raced along her throat whenever his mouth touched her palm.

“But…” she began.

He cut off her thoughts as he pulled her closer with each kiss up her arm until he could rest her elbow at his neck. Pinching her shirt closed he used the satiny material to drag the rest of her closer. He was glad he’d pulled away the blankets. Let her cling to him for warmth.

Leaning forward slowly he gave her every chance to withdraw, until his lips lightly brushed against hers.

“What did you mean?” she whispered when he inched away.

“Hmm?” he replied lazily, meeting her eyes as they listened to Mammon mumble in his sleep. 

Her tension only unwinding when he let his hand dip behind to hold her. He leaned in close, pressing her in to him so he could speak quietly in her ear.

“I suspect he still has it because otherwise his stomach acid would eat through his body if he didn’t keep healing it,” he explained before dragging his tongue the short distance between her neck to her ear.

He absorbed the subtle shift of her chest towards him, the hitch in her breathing.

She pulled back after a moment, realizing how she was subtly offering herself to him.

He could wait.

“Why would you tell him?” she asked, the uncertainty and vulnerability obvious to him in the dim light.

They’d been fighting constantly. Even dinner wasn’t neutral ground any longer. Why would he tell Beelzebub something that only he could help her with?

“I want to make you mine,” he pointed out again without a hint of embarrassment. 

He could see her falling into her thoughts and continued, “If that means tending to your injuries in a way that I don’t like…” he let out an annoyed huff of breath to ruffle the fringe of his hair from his eyes. “Well, then, that comes first.”

His eyes chased her expressions: the surprise, the bashful reluctance to believe his flattery, the appetite for certitude.

He hummed his impatience. It was both too close but also reassuring and she returned to her place under his lips, close against his supporting arm.

“I might not always let you come first,” he said, his voice still low, “or at all, but I will always put you first.”

The way he said it made her lower half quiver, her breaths short and stuttered.

“You belong here, right on the tip of my tongue,” he whispered to her.

She tried to breath slowly, with measure. How stupid could she be to swoon over this? His mouth was made for lies. ‘Beautiful, seductive lies,’ she thought, closing her eyes against the dizzy pounding of her heart.

It would be too embarrassing to fade to black just for his mouth on her ear and his hand at her side.

“Why?” she whispered a bit too harshly.

She felt his hand leave her waist to find her belly button, trying not to lean in to the sensation as it travelled up the part in her night shirt. His palm floated past where he’d held her down earlier, rising to cup the side of her neck, sliding his thumb softly across her throat. She swallowed and remained still.

His thumb paused, and she tried to look up at him. His mouth was curved the way it had been when he pledged himself to her by the lake: shy and sweet.

“I realized you were the only person in all of time who could have ever pulled me back from my hatred,” he admitted, “Not Beel, not Diavolo, not even Lilith. I watched you start to smile as I choked the life out of you, and that’s when I knew I was in love.”

She blew air at his ear.

“You have a weird Ophelia complex. Got it,” she snarked bemusedly.

Suddenly, his hands were on either side of her waist, his face even with hers, and his fingers poised to tickle.

But the playfulness dimmed in his eyes and his fingers untensed slightly, “I’m serious. When you… expired in my arms, I could finally see how ridiculously shiny your soul was. It was blinding. There’s no one else who would put their trust in me again just to continue bringing me back to the fold, no one who would try like that.”

“Hmm, unexpected saviour complex then,” she whispered conspiratorially. His smile was worth it even if inside a tiny echo of mistrust still strummed.

“Something like that,” he chuckled with her, “but I’ve had time since then to learn to love you in other ways too.”

She wanted to curse the way his words could shift and melt her inhibitions so easily.

He tried not to let his smugness show as she visibly softened.

“I think though,” he answered her body language, “That I would like to claim one of my kisses now.”

He bid the glow lamps to extinguish with the flick of a finger and they were in darkness. She could hide her blush, he decided, so long as she said yes.

“But, Mammon--”

“Is very much asleep.”

He waited.

“This one counts then,” she whispered before his lips were on her.

The fingers that had threatened to tickle her moments ago were grabbing her ass, his grip almost brutal, drawing a leg over his hip, encouraging her to grind against him as he took her kisses and returned them more harshly.

Her leg firmly hooked over him, he released one of the globes filling his hands and shoved her shirt off her shoulder instead.

The cold air and the slide of the fabric from her shoulder was sudden and she clung to him, her arms over his shoulders. But he rolled, pressed her back into the mattress, untwining her arms to hold them down at her sides while she rose in surprise and arousal against his knee between her legs.

She bit back a moan as he lowered himself, pressing her half exposed chest against the flesh of his own, mouth next to ear again, “I bet if I let you, you’d come all over my leg while Mammon sleeps.”

She shook. His tongue was in her mouth again before she could answer. Her only feedback was her hands grasping just barely at the fabric of his shorts, her fingertips reaching for the hem of fabric at his knees.  
She followed him as he pulled away, only his strength holding her down. He smiled and released her; her nails were in his lower back instantly, pulling him back down to her.

“I love how much you crave me,” he breathed, letting his lips travel south to worship her neck, “even with your little claws.”

She felt his teeth, his smile, against her throat when she let a small noise of appreciation escape. Her hands fled from his back, trying to stifle herself by reducing the sensations.

“If you won’t touch me,” he warned, “then you won’t be allowed to.” 

He drew back again; she was a vision, breathing hard under him. He rocked her hips up and stole the sleeve of her shirt, pulling it under her, arm and all.

Oh that anger in her eyes was delicious.

The trailing panels and sleeve he looped around her free arm, pinning it to his knee as he slid the fabric under it.

He brought his thumb to brush over her lower lip, keeping her eyes focused on him while he continued to over sensitize. He lifted his hand away just as she moved to nip him.

“Now, now,” he offered, as if he were telling her a secret, moving over her again, hand braced next to her shoulder. Her head jerked back, his other hand buried in her hair, “If you start that, we’ll be playing much rougher than Mammon will sleep through.”

“I think you’ll have a hard time toying with me then,” she retorted. “I scratch and bite.”

His delight was obvious, deviltry gleaming in the dark from the glow of his eyes. He didn’t release his grip on her as he lowered himself again, letting his thigh grind against her, inviting her to try not to whine while Mammon slept.

“You’ll crawl and beg, too,” he promised, darkly.

The small breathy cry she let out was too loud. Mammon’s arm searched for her in the bed, patting the mattress until he found the warm flesh of her stomach.

“What a conundrum you’ve gotten yourself into,” he whispered, allowing Mammon’s hand to pass over her arm and rest on her torso.

“Belphie!” she squeaked quietly.

He watched as Mammon’s hand moved over her, managing to avoid anywhere that would usually get him slapped but he settled back in to sleep when his hand reached the other side of her waist, curling there protectively.

A part of her wanted to throw his hand off and demand Belphegor continue what he started, but the other part couldn’t help but find amusement in the situation.

“It appears you’ve been cockblocked, oh slothful one,” she laughed quietly,even as she burned for more.

The press of his thumb over her clit subdued her merriment as she tried not to jostle Mammon or make a sound, but her hips rose to meet him, increasing the pressure.

A “tsk tsk” scolded her in the dark. 

Mammon mumbled, he was closer now, and patted her side while she tried not to wiggle any further.

“If you think I won’t fuck you while he watches, you’re very much mistaken,” he said pulling slowly at the drawstring of her pants. “So, you’d better tell me now what you want.”

She licked her lips in the dark, uncertain if he could see her pained expression.

He knew she would dominate Beel easily, like soft putty in her hands, but he suspected if he remained mostly respectful, she'd willingly submit to him soon. He could wait just a little bit longer.

The airy, irritated laugh that fell down to her seemed loud in the quiet room.

“Just this once for you,” he said softly, reaching for Mammon’s arm.

She felt him lean to her right, and then Mammon’s arm was gone. She released the breath she’d been accidentally holding.

But the dip in the bed rolled away and Mammon disappeared from her shoulder.

“What, you thought I’d share you more today?” Belphegor mocked her, words un-whispered and amused. “Then again, you like it this way don’t you? When I take away your choices and let you feel.”

If possible, her heart rate doubled. His fingers walked up her side.

“Now, where were we? Oh yes, I was claiming the rest of my kiss.” 

She swallowed hard as he leaned in to recapture her lips.

“I think that counts as more than one kiss then,” she whispered back.

“You think so?” he asked, letting his lips brush against her cheek with each word instead, “but I didn’t say which kiss I was claiming.”

He could feel her stiffen under him.

“Mammon will be out for hours… and you didn’t think I’d forget about today’s kiss to Beel, did you?” His lips were kissing slowly down her neck, wet, only his breath to reheat them.

“I suspect,” he said, bringing his hands back to her body, “he got a very good kiss today, if your smooth skin is anything to go by.”

He punctuated his conjecture with his teeth at the juncture of her neck and shoulder. This time she did cry out for him, her body lifting to meet him.

His hand found her hair again, exposing her neck further to him but he only asked her instead, “If I let you up, will you behave?”

“D-do I have to?” she sighed. “If he’s asleep?”

“That’s my girl,” he growled and released her from her shirt’s hold.

Her hands were on him, skating over his naked torso, memorizing the unnatural heat of his skin, the dips of his musculature. Her mouth never left his.

Without moving he brought the lights up the barest amount, letting her make out just the shadows of him while he devoured her, hands sliding to cup her breasts. Her whimper broke their kiss. 

“We’re more compatible than I’d hoped,” he said, watching the glitter of her eyes before removing his leg from between her thighs. He didn’t have to pull her to the edge of the bed; she crawled the short distance to him.

He felt her tongue on his stomach, “Hmm, so you’re curious too…” he said, leaning away from her and into the stone wall, her fingertips still trying to grasp at his hips.

“Belphegor, come back,” she pouted. She was a sight: topless, breathless, wanting.

“Do you want to touch me more?” he teased, pulling her hands to his torso, leaving her planked over the gap. He could feel her trying to maintain her balance and stand and brought her into his arms before she could.

“If so, I don’t mind.”

“You’re such a brat,” she muttered into the dip between his pectorals.

“Am I?” he asked with false shock. “What ever will I do?”

She kicked him lightly in the shin, only serving to stub her toe and he laughed in to her neck.

“Do you think you could help reform me?” he asked, stroking her hair softly. She couldn’t tell any longer if he was playing with her; a hand had fallen to her ass, pressing her to his obvious erection.

“Let’s find out how well healed you are,” he said, his voice guttural. 

If her nipples hadn’t already been hard, they would have pebbled against his chest then.

His kiss disoriented her again. It took a moment to understand the cold at her back was the stone wall.

“Give me the parts of you that you refuse to give anyone else,” he growled through her.

Her skin goosebumped under his hands, but she said nothing, eye closed as she shook her head ‘no.’

“So stubborn…” he sighed, tugging once more at the drawstring of her pants and deftly sliding his hand down to cup her.

Her eyes flew open, meeting his, and then drifted to somewhere behind him.

"Is that your idea of fun? That's fine if it is, but he’ll have to wait until next time to watch."

“No, just--”

He dipped a finger into her folds, testing her tenderness--cursing and blessing Beelzebub’s thoroughness--as she dug her nails into his shoulders.

“Do you need something from me?” he asked.

“Yeees.”

She didn’t need the lights to know he was smirking down at her.

“Then be mine,” he said, taking her mouth again as he pressed deeper into her.

“I can’t,” she panted when he let her breathe, clenching around his finger.

“But you’re so wet for me already,” he said, his Infernal growl impressing on her the slide between his fingers and what he intended to do about it.

His hand might be the only thing holding her up, she realized as her legs shook.

“If you intend to fuck me anyways, why are you waiting?” she taunted, her words bravado in the extreme.

“You make it so difficult to treat you nicely,” he said, slamming her the tiny distance between her and the wall she’d left.

A second finger slid into her, pumping, his thumb gliding slick across her clit with each return and exit of his fingers. He never stayed completely inside her, the loose pants allowing him to pull out completely and penetrate her again easily.

Her moan was worth her taunting, he decided.

“I want to tell you how much I love you while I hold you and kiss you softly. But I also have an overwhelming urge to call you my filthy whore and make you cum over and over again until you beg for forgiveness. Is that what you want?”

“Yes,” she moaned for him again.

“Say you belong to me,” he nearly snarled. “Say you belong to me and I’ll give you what you want right now.”

“Belphieee…” she whined, out of breath as his weight and his fingers drove it out of her along with the images he painted. “You know I can’t.”

She sounded desperate.

He sighed. “Then be mine for tonight,” he said softly, his forehead resting against hers, his hand below stilled as he caressed her cheek with the other.

Her ‘yes’ was a surge of energy passing through him like wind. He tried not to be startled by it, her eyes were still closed. Celestial. Something he hadn’t heard in millenia.

When he didn’t begin moving again, she brought her lips to his jaw line, trailing her kisses and clenching around him.

He could feel the obeisance on her tongue, but he was still halted, uncertain whether she knew she was speaking or not.

A deep breath. “Are you trying to get on my good side?” he asked.

“Definitely,” she said, eyes still closed to feel him better.

He loved how airy she sounded. There was none of the snark she used to keep his brothers in line.

He slid her bottoms off and let them pool at their feet.

“I don’t know...” he said, pettiness apparent. “I’m not even sure if you deserve to cum tonight.”

She squirmed against him with impatient irritation until he slowly began to move in her again.

“Maybe I should just take my pleasure from you and leave you wanting until you’ll come to me,” He tilted his head away, looking away in thought.

“Please?” she said, her voice tiny when she opened her eyes in shock.

He was looking at her again, his expression predatory and cruel, enhanced by the horns she had drawn out of him with her first yes.

“Say it again.”

“Please,” she said, just above a whisper.

“I don’t think that will do,” he said, speeding up his fingers and pressing harshly against her clit.

Her short shriek was pleasant to his ears.

“Please, Belphegor!” she cried loudly and he withdrew from inside her completely.

His sticky fingers left a trail to her hip, “You’ll be happy with whatever I give or don’t give you,” he said darkly and she nodded vigorously.

“Ah, say it properly,” he prompted.

“Yes,” she said. 

She couldn’t help but love the way his voice sounded, as if she were the one making things difficult for him: impatient, bored, certain.

“Much better,” he said, rewarding her with a kiss. He distracted her briefly with it as he dropped his own shorts beneath them.

His hands returned to her hips lifting her up the wall.

She felt it rough and cold on her back and whimpered until his mouth was on her breast and her hands back in his hair.

“Belphegor,” she cried sofly above him, “Why won’t you just fuck me?”

He adjusted his grip, bouncing her slightly to cup her ass and spread her legs, allowing her to slowly drag down the wall closer to his waiting cock.

Her own little growl of impatience greeted him as he nudged gently at her entrance. “Hurry up!”

He stopped completely and he could see her horror.

“Open your mouth again and I’ll fill it instead,” he warned and let her slide another inch, just barely inside her.

Another inch. “The only thing I should hear from you is ‘yes’ and ‘please’.”

She whimpered and rocked as much as he would let her.

Lower. “I suppose I’ll let you scream my name too,” he said, smiling.

“How gracious of you,” the sarcastic remark left before her hand could cover her mouth.

He lifted her off him.

“No, no, no, no. I’m sorry,” she pleaded.

He raised an eyebrow, testing her sincerity.

“Please, Belphegor, pleaase.”

He let her drop completely to the base of his cock. Enjoying the way she writhed and gripped him. Her hands scrambled to find the best place to clutch him to her even as she arched away.

Perfect. He’d imagined her like this far too many times. He held still, appreciating the moment.

“Please more,” she said.

He heard her testing his instructions and he delivered a chastizing bite to the top of her breast as he slapped one of her ass cheeks.

She squealed and squeezed him. 

“I won’t be rushed when I’ve waited patiently all day. Certainly not after sending Beel to heal you.” He tried to keep the bitterness from his voice, choosing instead to recede and thrust slowly into her.

Her little chants of ‘yes’ and ‘mmm’ were music to him.

He shifted her weight to one hand, bringing the other around her waist. He frowned at the grit and cold he found there, even as she tried to fuck herself on him and mark his shoulders with her mouth.

He sighed heavily, obviously put upon, and she held to him tighter, unwilling to release him for whatever she’d accidently done to disobey.

“I coddle you too much,” he whispered in her ear and pulled her away from the wall, brushing away the grit with his warm hand.

He was glad she couldn’t see the euphoric expression on his face when she nuzzled into his neck and sighed, striping his world in shades of comfort and sex.

He carried her on to the bed, but he didn’t stop at the edge.

She pulled away, her eyes screaming, “What are you doing!?”

He only smiled dangerously, glad she hadn’t spoken. He so wanted to reward her tonight.

“Well, since he’s not able to watch us tonight, it’s only fair that we let Mammon help, isn’t it?”

A whine of unease escaped her as he laid her shoulders across Mammon’s thighs. He swallowed the sound letting his surety relax her while he rocked slowly into her.

Her hands no longer tentative at his sides, she pawed at his shoulders, sliding her fingers through his hair and along his neck. 

He loved when she gripped his horns like that.

Pulling away he let her head fall back beyond Mammon’s thigh. Lifting her ass higher, he snapped his hips to hers, the sound echoing in the room as she panted and moaned for him. He fucked her with his arms under her knees until she grew too loud.

He released her leg, shifting the other to his shoulder, folding her in half with his weight. His mouth covered hers, stealing her sounds around teeth and lips and tongue.

“When you come to me, when I’m done with you, not even Asmodeus will recognize you,” he grunted harshly.

She was close. She wanted to tell him but bit her lip instead, barring him from her mouth.

He moved to her neck instead, thrusting faster, driving across that spot that made her want to shout as it shot sparks up her spine.

He came erratically in her, sucking long and hard at the pulse of her neck.

The look of utter betrayal she gave him. Delicious. He would treasure it always.

The way she said his name in despair and anger, perfect.

“I didn’t say you’d get to cum,” he said arrogantly.

She threw her arm across her eyes, trying to quell her upset, inhaling instead of letting the sound out. Her heart still beating rapidly.

But he felt it, the waves of fading trust as she tried to pant silently and failed, the sound striking him like ice water.

It made him want to be sick the way he felt it, cold and clammy, against his skin. 

He pulled out of her and gathered her to him even as she tried to pull away, her arm still across her eyes. He’d created a monster. A beautiful monster. 

He kissed her softly everywhere he could reach while she was upright in his arms, but she still wouldn’t look at him.

“I won’t leave you wanting,” he promised, his voice raw with concern.

He kissed her lips softly, waiting until she would kiss him back again.

He wanted to soothe her in Celestial, but those thoughts and feelings were weighted down and rusted. It was something he had shunned until now. He growled his concern to her instead, letting the deep Infernal notes shake her.

She brought her arm away from her face but she wouldn’t open her eyes for him. Tears caught in her eyelashes, face red from the incline and intensity of emotion.

He brought her closer still, her head resting over his shoulder.

The small sob that escaped her almost broke him.

The embarrassment was too much and she moved to cover her face with her hands instead.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered to her, stroking her back, but she only shuddered silently. He considered himself blessed that no sound left her now.

He pulled her back under the covers with him, bundling her up with comfort and warmth in his arms. She faced him but her eyes were still closed.

“Stop looking at me,” she finally said, her cheeks damp and red.

“I will never look away from you when you trust me with this side of yourself,” he declared quietly to her.

She sniffled and opened her eyes. They were red rimmed even in the dim light.

“Let me love all of you,” he petitioned her, holding her hands in his own, searching her face for any trace of acceptance or refusal. Waiting. It felt like forever until she spoke.

“Idiot,” she said, and gave him a timid kiss.

He peppered her face with feather light kisses of his own until she smiled for him. He would take all night to make it up to her, he promised himself. At least until Mammon began to rouse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	41. Valentine's Day Surprise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chocolate.  
> Just Checking In.  
> RUN!
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

Valentine's Day

She slept deeply, physically and emotionally spent again, but she had woken early feeling better than she had felt in the last three days. Certainly not enough sleep but still better. Once again, her bed was covered in demon, both Belphegor and Mammon taking up as much room as possible on either side of her.

She wiggled out from under limbs, having to cajole early morning mumblings before they released her.

She collected clothes for the day. This morning she needed to get in gear and commandeer the kitchen before breakfast to do another test run of chocolate… and create time to think about her “confession note” for Leviathan.

‘The things these bathroom walls would tell if they could talk,’ she thought while doing a quick primp, ‘Lucifer on bended knee, Asmodeus, last night’s sweet shower…”.

Capris, a collared shirt and wrap; Asmodeus would be pleased with something “swoopy” at least. She pulled her collar a little higher to cover an overly eager nibble from the night before and left the room quietly.

Tea steeping, she set out her ingredients and got to work.

“Good morning,” Lucifer said, stepping into the kitchen behind her.

She caught the bowl before it fell to the floor, clutching it awkwardly to her aproned hip.

“A bit of warning next time,” she grumbled quietly to him, letting the strained melody impress how unimpressed she was. She was still trying not to let her early morning confectionary activities wake Mammon a wall away. He wasn’t allowed any chocolates until he amended his compliment.

“I thought the salutation was the warning?” 

Her tea was still too hot after she strained it, so she returned to her seat at the table and began powdering the second batch. 'There's no reason for this to be awkward,' she thought. 'We were both adults dealing with a magic issue. Just act like everything is normal.'

She could hear Lucifer behind her, filling a glass with water.

“You’re up early,” he said.

“Yes, I promised Levi chocolate today, and I don’t intend to disappoint,” she said with a confident smile. ‘Yes, good job not blushing like a schoolgirl!’ she cheered herself.

“What’s the occasion?” he asked, leaning against the counter.

“Valentine’s Day,” she said a little too chipper for her liking. She felt his eyes narrowing on her without looking up.

“I didn’t realize Old Jack was still up to his tricks, scaring children like Leviathan.”

She looked up from her work then, eyes bright. She always enjoyed learning more of human history from Lucifer, but more often than not it was Satan who had time for her.

“Nowadays, chocolate is mostly exchanged between friends, family, and lovers. Not just sweets for children,” she corrected.

His gloved fingers affected a dull noise as he tapped the glass in his hands, head canted slightly in thought.

“Don’t tell Diavolo, though,” she said, holding her finger to her lips and daring a wink. “Otherwise, we’ll be roped in to something for sure.”

There was that smile that made her weak in the knees. The one that matched his voice before he grabbed her.

She reached for her tea, but he left his leaning post to slide it out of her reach, pressing the glass of water into her hand midair instead. She telegraphed her confusion obviously and moved to set the glass down where her tea had been, but one of his fingers stilled it before it could reach the table, pushing it and her hand up.

She was sure the look she gave him screamed, “you’re all weirdos!” but she gave up; he had yet to kill her accidentally or otherwise so she would play along.

She was thirsty so she drank. Not because he was making her.

“If you’re going to keep this up, you’re going to need to hydrate,” he lectured.

Avoiding spitting her water out brought her a small sense of pride. This time she couldn’t avoid the blush that spread rapidly over her.

“Excuse you?!” she said when she could breathe again.

“I haven’t seen Asmodeus look so pleased without leaving the house before, and you are the only factor that has changed,” he said.

She coughed and dragged her tea back to herself with a glare. That wasn’t an admission. It was just a glare for destroying morning tea time. Satan would be appalled… or amused… or both.

She shook away the warm memory of one of Satan’s sleepy phone calls and returned to her chocolates. She wouldn’t acknowledge what he’d said and leave it at that.

An ‘eep’ left her before she knew she was falling backwards.

‘That JACKASS!’ she thought as she felt his arm balancing her in a precarious dip.

“Did you really have to kick out the back of the chair?” she asked acerbically.

It only made his smile broader. Her eyes followed his as he looked at her bare legs. Only half on show outside her capris, fluffy slippers pointed up towards the ceiling.

“Now when did you have the time to heal up all of the lovely art I left on you?” He asked, tilting her back up to inspect her calves.

“Plenty of time,” she said, deadpan, “but I don’t have as much time to practice chocolatiering as I would like.”

Maybe she just needed to stop leaving obvious hints and be outright blunt with these demons, but that meant they’d have to actually want to respond to the obvious appropriately, hint or not.

He just lifted her leg higher and stooped less.

“Really, some sort of magic? Potions?”

“Cats,” she said to fuck with him, “and do you mind?”

“No, not at all. Thank you for asking,” he answered. “Cats you say?”

“Broken bones, joint and tendon repair, and wound healing; yup, cat purrs are great for humans,” she huffed trying to look intimidating, hands on hips. “Now would you please release me so that I can get back to work?”

He relinquished her leg with a presumptuous look, as if he could manhandle her whenever he liked.

“You're high handed in your methods, Lucifer, kindness or no,” she said, staring him down, “but I’m surprised you haven’t realized by now that I’ll find a way to thwart the best laid of your plans.”

She sipped at her tea, willing him to argue the point. It was fascinating to watch the coal of his eyes heat to red.

“You tread a very fine line,” he said, but she felt the low rumble that accompanied it.

Her head tilted in thought instead of fear.

He watched her eyes move slowly side to side, something humans did often he noticed when they were trying to remember something.

“Would you please say that again?” She asked sweetly, unaffected by his obvious threat.

If her words had been a blow he would have rocked back half a step.

“I said,” as he closed the distance between them again to take the lapel of her collar in hand, “You tread a very fine line.”

A smile bloomed on her face. The tiniest wiggle of happiness apparent while he tried to figure out what was happening under his nose.

She stood and he didn’t release her shirt, letting him look at the mark she’d tried to cover, fixing his tie for him instead.

“Your thoughts are beautiful, Lucifer.” she said, patting her handiwork, “they all feel brave.”

She sat back down and her shirt collar slipped from his grasp.

“Try one?” she asked, offering him a chocolate.

He took one and chewed, keeping his confusion to himself.

“If you say they’re not bad for a human, I’ll throw them at you instead of offering you another,” she warned.

He smiled at that, no longer trying to hide his thoughts behind chewing. “Mammon?”

“Mammon,” she confirmed.

“I will most certainly be telling Lord Diavolo about this human tradition, however.” He said, pilfering another and popping it in his mouth.

She waited, watching him chew and taste. ‘However?’

“However,” he repeated, lifting another chocolate, “I will avoid underestimating your particular brand of entropy in the future.”

He was quick. His hand was at her mouth, pushing the chocolate to her lips, until the tip of his glove passed her teeth.

“It’s important for the chocolatier to taste their work,” he said, removing his hand and watching the fight in her rise to his challenge.

“I’ll be heading out early,” he said, while her mouth was full, “Have a good morning.”

She really did consider throwing chocolate at him. But knowing him he’d just catch it and eat it.

Instead, she chewed grumpily, willing away the heat of her cheeks and checked her D.D.D.. Still no online activity from Leviathan. She was starting to get worried.

One more test batch, then she’d go see if he’d come down for breakfast. She didn’t want to be in the kitchen when it was Mammon’s turn to burn water.

* * *

She put down the latest test batch on a hall table, she’d see if Beel and Belphegor would be her chocolate guinea pigs after she coaxed Leviathan out for breakfast.

Knocking and calling did nothing. Not even a demand for a password.

She leaned against the opposite wall wondering what to do. Should she go get Satan? Call Lucifer? No, definitely not calling Lucifer.

Three little demons squeezed out of a seam in the wall and she watched fascinated as they appeared one after another. She sat down to get closer to their level; they scurried over when they saw her attention.

“I’m worried about Leviathan,” she told them, trying her best to convey her thoughts in a way that wasn’t so human. She couldn’t make the right sounds, but she could at least try for the feelings and images, right? Maybe they could feel this the way other things seemed to taste her fear?

They growled and popped amongst themselves and she tried, but their words were still fuzzy at best. Across the hall they rushed and slid under Leviathan’s door. She waited.

One by one they shot out from under the door, small waves of water pushing them out. They sputtered.

“Oh Sweetling, I'm so sorry. I’m sorry, all of you.” She apologized as they coughed and shook water out of what she thought might be ear holes. None of them were scaly or had coral-like horns like her pitcher buddy; they must not do well with water.

She watched in alarm as one wrung out its wing and then leg.

They hissed and growled in a frenzied chorus. They were obviously emphatic about what they were saying.

She lay down on the hall carpet and waved them closer to her ear, plugging the other with a finger.

It was static until she closed her eyes:  
RUN  
RUN!  
DANGER  
DANGER for HUMANS

That was all she needed. She ran to the nearest occupied room, snatching her paper bag of chocolates on the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	42. Speechless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having fled from outside Leviathan's room from an unknown danger, MC finds herself without the right words in different situations.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

She swung the door open without thinking or looking, turning to slam it behind her and listen intently with her ear to the wood. Nothing yet.

‘Were they just fucking with me? Was there nothing to run from?’

She was just about to curse their nicknames and stomp back out into the hallway when a gasp behind her drew her attention from the door.

Slowly, she turned on the spot.

Buffering, that’s the only way to describe how her brain seemed to skip over comprehension for a moment.

She’d run into Beelzebub and Belphegor’s room. And there they were. Very naked. And very much entwined in one another.

“I’ve come at a bad time. I’ll just ask Satan!” she said, and bolted from the room. Emergencies and naked demons didn’t mix for her.

She’d lost her fuzzy slippers again some time between Leviathan’s door and their’s so her traction was better as she skidded around the corner to bang loudly on Satan’s locked door.

“Satan, I don’t care if you’re asleep, I command you to **open your door this instant**!”

She stepped through the door and closed it behind her, locking it again and rushed over to the sleepy demon, still half in bed and half on the floor.

He’d clearly used magic to unlock the door.

Kneeling at his bedside, she pushed him back into an upright position, and tried to ignore his nakedness as he wrapped himself in what appeared to be the only sheet still left on the bed.

“Why are you calling me at this horrible hour?” he asked through a yawn as he stretched back out.

“There’s something wrong with Levi,” she said with urgency.

He took in her distress and pushed his hair out of his eyes, trying to wake himself a bit.

“Staying in his room for a day or two isn’t anything to be—”

“No!” she said vehemently. “Something is wrong.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“I…I don’t know.”

He groaned and pulled his pillow over his head.

“You’re welcome to sleep here until breakfast,” he said, mumbling through the pillow, dismissing her claims.

She fidgeted with her hands in her lap, thinking. She couldn’t repeat their words. She couldn’t make those sounds.

“Satan?” she called with no effect. Trying again, she shook his shoulder gently.

“Young Mistress, you had better have a very good reason for poking the sleeping bear. I do not remain a cuddly teddy for long.”

“Can you summon one of the Little Demons?” she asked, her question intense enough that he couldn’t ignore it or snap at her right away.

“Yes.”

“Satan.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Quit it, I’m serious. Something is wrong, they said so.”

He rolled his eyes at her, but ogled the paper bag at her side.

“What are those?”

“Chocolates I made for Valentine’s day.”

He perked up and she held them up and away from him. "You can eat all of them if you call the little one I call Sweetling. I’m certain he’s one of yours."

His hand beckoned and she placed the bag in his palm.

‘Did he do it?’ she wondered after a quiet moment. ‘They can turn out lights without moving. Can they send out a call without moving as well?’ She pursed her lips in suspicion. “Did you just steal my chocolate and do nothing?”

He gave her a look that told her to shut up. It lasted about as long as it took for the chocolate to hit his tongue, then he was all rainbows and sunshine again.

‘Almost as bad as Beel,’ she thought. She blushed and put away the last image of Beelzebub and Belphegor together somewhere far out of her mind. She’d think about that later.

The Little Demon fell from a seam in the ceiling paneling. It bounced on the mattress near where she thought Satan’s feet likely were.

“She says there’s something wrong with Leviathan,” Satan said to the large, black mote.

The static popping and tiny growls were nothing like what he’d said before.

She lifted him up by the tail. “Don’t you dare fib in front of me, Mister!” she scolded, giving him a little shake. “Now you tell him exactly what you three said to me, or you will NEVER get another slice of spicy rainbow pizza from me again!”

He dropped into the palm of her other hand, swatting at her tail snatching fingers. The gargle and croup he produced sounded closer to what she’d heard, but she couldn’t concentrate as well as before.

“Well done,” he told the Little Demon, giving it half a chocolate.

He eyed her with renewed interest as the Little Demon scampered off.

“Leviathan should be fine,” he reassured her. “He’s just…surly right now.”

“Surly isn’t enough to be dangerous to me,” she said, and she watched his delicate eyebrow arch further into his unruly mane.

“How would you…”

“I can figure things out pretty quickly when I’m in danger.” She didn’t feel like delving into that right now. Leviathan was more important.

“Levi’ll be fine.” Satan yawned again. “He always works through it. Give him a few days.”

To say she was put out was an understatement. “But he won’t answer my messages. Levi is supposed to be my Valentine. And tonight is raid night.”

“Oh, I see," he said, starting to rise from the bed. "I hadn’t realized.”

“Satan! Clothing!” she shouted, hands over her eyes.

His laughter was nice. It slowed her frenzied heart, and she took her hands away when she thought he’d settled back under the sheet.

“Apparently, today is the day all of you decide to be naked,” she said, muttering to herself.

She tried not to look too defeated as she made her way back to the door. “Let me know how the chocolates are. You’re my guinea pig,” she said as she lifted the door latch. “I’m going to go make sure we don’t have burnt instant noodles for breakfast.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	43. Run With the Hare and Hunt With the Hounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC saves everyone from burnt noodles for breakfast and tries to sneak in some alone time.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

Hell Sauce flavour instant noodles were not exactly what came to mind when she thought of breakfast. No matter how much of the flavour packet Mammon held back when she wasn’t looking.

“Mammon, we’re not having instant noodles again.”

“But they’re cheap and easy.”

“So are you, but we don’t let Beel eat you!”

His eyes nearly bugged out of his head and she covered her mouth with her hand.

She was letting her irritation get the better of her. 'Fuck this!' She wanted to throw pans through the wall into the dining room. 'Could just one day make fucking sense? One day of not running on instinct this week?'

Mammon’s boisterous belly laugh halted her fuming.

“I'll let you pick out breakfast!” he said between tears, crouching on the kitchen floor and steadying himself against the table.

She couldn’t help but laugh too and she joined him on the floor. His smile was always contagious.

“Just promise to never tell Asmo that,” he choked out. He coughed a few times to try and clear the laughter from his system.

She nodded sheepishly before he hauled her up to stand with him.

“Okay, let’s see what we have for ingredients!” she said with a clap of her hands.

Mammon only rolled his eyes before he roved through the pantry and fridge, calling out behind himself.

“Baby kraken, this one in your drawer says 'brussel sprouts,' cockatrice eggs, lantern turnips.”

She thought through options. "How much ngepet bacon is there?"

“A few pounds. Axomama’s babies, this is either poison hemlock or red lace…not sure which, dogs tail seeds, apple juice…” he continued listing off as he went.

She could work with this. Apple risotto could be made in big enough quantities to feed Beelzebub, at least for a while. “I can put it all together, but you’re going to have to stir the cauldron,” she told him, lifting a paddle to hand it to him.

His blush was sweet. It was too hard not to tease him. “Keep looking at the paddle like that and breakfast will be late,” she said. Let him take that whichever way he liked.

He chased her around the table, but his frustrated exclamations lacked real menace and had her laughing again.

“Alright, back to work, or I really will let Beel eat you,” she warned.

Black bacon roasted on flat sheets, popping and hissing. She took over stirring so that Mammon could cut through the bigger tentacles for her.

When they were done, she could see he was proud of their work. He carried out the pots of breakfast oden and lifted the cauldron out to the side board. She had carefully nicked some risotto for herself and tossed bacon into her bowl while she slid the majority of the slices onto a platter for him.

“I’m going to eat in my room,” she told him as he took the platter from her. “I’ve got some things to work on.”

His frown settled in for the long haul with the pinch of his eyebrows.

It was obvious he wanted to show off breakfast to his brothers, and just as obvious that he wanted her there while he flaunted it in their faces.

She gave him her best reassuring smile and turned him around to point him towards the dining room. It was very tempting to pat his butt; Asmodeus hadn’t been wrong. Instead she sent him off with encouragement.

“Do us proud,” she said happily, nudging him forward. “I’ll be in my room if you need me.”

* * *

She didn’t bother locking the door and quickly slid the bowl under her bed. A fluffy pillow soon followed and she rolled under last.

At least this way they would walk in and out while she remained hidden for a bit.

The risotto and meat were gone quickly. Her panic-running this morning had been an excellent appetite stimulant and Mammon did a good job on food whenever he set his mind to it.

She slid the bowl out into the middle of the room, glad she had cleaned yesterday and avoided any dust tracks this morning.

Her D.D.D. set to silent, she lay on the pillow to get some quiet thinking time in.

She messaged Leviathan. Still nothing. ‘What could be going on with him?’

It was clearly something Satan thought was out of her league if he would mislead her.

She sighed for the umpteenth time.

Was it possible for all these feelings to slowly continue to unfurl around her rather than unravel? She’d managed to get physical with four of the seven brothers and she wasn’t much closer to knowing where she stood.

It had been clear by morning that Belphegor was sincere. It’s amazing what a few orgasms can do to force water under the bridge, but when she’d seen him with Beelzebub locked around him, he’d looked at her with dread. It caused her all kinds of confusion again.

Beelzebub was always the sweetest even when he was being devious. Their tryst had turned out to be for a good cause, and not just that she was special to him. Was she only special to him because Belphegor had felt that way? 'If Belphie isn’t just toying with me, that is.'

“You can’t ruin friendship with sex,” Beelzebub had said to her. Was that what they were, what he wanted? The expression on his face when she saw him with Belphegor…It seemed natural for him.

She hadn’t existed for him in that room, his expression full of pleasure and nothing else.

None of them were alike; there were no “blood” issues, having been created and not born, but it was abundantly clear now that they were more than just brothers-in-arms.

She knew she wanted more. It was hard wanting them both, while they were so opposed to one another being with her. Why would they fight one another in front of her, only to fuck one another behind closed doors?

It didn’t matter. Maybe that just saved her heart ache in the long run.

Lucifer was, well, Lucifer. Where she stood with him would always be a mystery. His pride would likely never let him tell her his whole thoughts and the power imbalance between them without a pact was too dangerous. It was already dangerous with pacts. She could easily chalk up their night together to him saving her flimsy, mortal life.

A smile took over her as she tried not to roll her eyes at her own ridiculous, wishy-washiness. At least Asmodeus had been expected at some point. She was only human after all. It had been a surprise to her that it wasn’t a stipulation of sealing their pact!

Thoughts of Leviathan and Mammon’s feelings, the extent of them, floated past her. Even Satan drifted past, as distant as he was.

Their feelings and her feelings shouldn’t even matter in this political clusterfuck.

Don’t trust angels, they’re the spies and agents of the Lord’s Judgment and Wrath. Don’t trust demons, they only want your soul. Don’t trust Solomon, he’s sneaky enough to be a demon and has the magic approved and harnessed by a god to match.

A gasp and tutting startled her from her contemplation. Asmodeus had strutted into her room, humming to himself as he rummaged through her wardrobe. He left as quickly as he’d come and she received a silent D.D.D. message from him, likely requesting she accompany him shopping for the party. She didn’t open it. It could wait.

She let out the air she’d been holding, and the tension in her body with it once she saw his expensive shoes retreat, and heard the door snap shut.

What would happen if she stayed? Would that unbalance things here? How would Devildom feel about a human at the side of one of their demon lords? Her temporary presence was already resented by at least some. She’d seen it in those willing to say it in front of her and risk the brothers’ wrath. She knew she was loathed by others for having their lords under her command. A threat to them all.

Belphegor came and went from her room, none the wiser for now. He’d only stopped to collect her bowl in the middle of the room before leaving.

If she left, and any of them decided to follow, the fall out would be terrible as well. There would be a power vacuum to be filled. Terra Firma might not be able to withstand having them for too long without destabilizing as well.

What if Diavolo said no to accompanying her? Or even to visit? Or to her staying here?

‘Oh my! An insurrection? For me? You shouldn’t have!’

A change in either plane would leave them open to the Celestial realm making a power play of their own. There were likely plenty of angels who still thought just as Luke did or worse.

Beelzebub knocked, and opened the door, but left when the room echoed his words back at him.

Whether she stayed or went, she would still be a target. She had become a weakness to more than one of them. How many times had she been kidnapped or cornered now? Would she survive without Mammon, even if she went home?

She could ask Satan; he had enough knowledge of political maneuverings and war.  
Would he be honest with her though? He’d shown already this morning that he omitted things with her. Could his advice be skewed by his, or his brothers’, affections for her?

The pillow muffled her frustrated groan as she mashed it into her face.

Perhaps Inara. She was powerful in her own right. Would that give her a strategic advantage, though, if she wanted more? It would be tempting for anyone, demon or not.

The apothecary, Amalthea; she never minced words and would know the average demon’s thoughts on her predicament, but could her information be bought from her afterwards? She didn’t have the same faith in Amalthea as she had in Inara, who had kindly introduced her to the former when the boys had rust for brains, and forgot human women had monthly cycles.

‘Barbatos would be a wiser choice,’ she thought. He, too, had drawbacks. He would report anything of concern to Diavolo, which in itself could be a danger to her and the Sins around her. Many rulers had tried to crush a coup before it had started.

She wanted to shoo those thoughts from her head. No demon in their right mind would ever start a rebellion for a human, a flash in the pan of existence, but she remembered the way she’d seen each of them change at the drop of a hat, consumed by their sin, destruction incarnate, thought driven from them unless another intervened, sometimes over something as small as a dessert or a book.

Even if everything worked out peacefully under this roof, it would have far-reaching effects.

Would Diavolo have Lucifer destroy his own brothers? Could he? If he didn’t, could he live with having broken his oath? Could Diavolo stay in power at all without their support?

She should have brought a glass of water with her. This much thinking was drying out her brain. Not that Lucifer was right in any way!

Barbatos could still see most of the options ahead of them, whether he told her with accuracy or not though would be another matter.

' _Clunk!_ '

She’d been distracted and hadn't heard anyone come in until the tall glass of water was set down near her head. Mammon rolled under the bed to join her with ease, and frustration welled in her again as he sidled up next to her and stole her pillow. When did her bedroom become the family room?

“Come here, stupid human,” he said to her. He quickly became her body pillow and she let the anger drop away. Mammon didn’t deserve it.

“Ain't it about time you told me what’s eatin’ you?”

“How’d you find me?” she asked instead.

“I think I know a thing or two about how to hide from my brothers,” he answered and jiggled her with the arm around her shoulders. “SO?”

“Mmph!” she said into his jacket.

“Gah! Don’t breathe your human germs on it, this is one of a kind.”

She stared at him. She slept with him almost every night, likely drooled on him, and he was trying to pretend he was upset about her breath on his jacket.

“Drink your water,” he said to distract her from staring. “I hear humans burn their mouths on warm food.”

She just stared at him over the rim of the glass as she drank.

“Now, I’m as patient as the next demon,” he started, “but as your first demon, it's kinda my job to know what’s wrong.”

The glass returned to its place outside the bed frame. He made no sense but maybe it wouldn’t hurt to confide in him.

“Everything is all mixed up,” she muttered into his shoulder. “Things are good, but also confusing, and no matter what I do something will go wrong.”

“Is this about Asmodeus?” Mammon asked.

“UGH, no. Him I can manage. That...that was an accident and I think he knows it. He’s been a sweetheart since.”

“Soooo?” His eyes were intently staring up at her bed slats.

“So either the Celestial realm and the Devildom need to deepen their peace process, and crush their hawk factions, or I need to go live in a protective bubble for the rest of my short human life.”

That was not what he’d been expecting at all. He’d wanted to know why she was so hurt physically, and maybe why she was too embarrassed to tell him about it. He hadn’t considered what else she’d been contemplating. He grunted, and stroked her arm. “You think too much."

“I think you’re all going to have to let me go, Mammon,” she said, trying to keep her voice from shaking. “When this semester ends, I won’t survive very long, no matter where I go or stay.”

This was what she’d been trying to push out of her mind for months. The safer she grew here during her stay, the more danger would lurk afterwards. It was probably too late already, and if anything happened to her at least one of them would snap.

“Are you doubting THE Great Mammon?”

“I never doubt my Mammoney,” she said quietly, trying to lift the mood. She’d hoped he would at least quirk a bit of smile at the use of his Devilgram handle, but there was nothing.

“You can’t possibly think that we’d just leave you to the jackals!” he practically shouted at her, squeezing her closer.

“I’m more afraid that you won’t,” she said.

“What does that even mean?” He pulled her on top of him so he could better see her face.

She had to duck to avoid the wooden slats until he shifted them over. “Mammon, think about it. Think about all of the ways the Devildom will go into uproar if any of you lose control, or, or don’t, but leave this plane for more than a visit. Think about it. What will Diavolo do if he can’t regain control right away?”

The way she looked at him pierced him through.

“Think of what Lucifer will be forced to choose between, again. That’s not even considering what the Celestial realm might do while everything is in chaos here. Whether I stay or go, live or die, there’s a very real chance of rebellion, or war, or both…A-and, I don’t know how to fix it.”

“All right, all right, I get ya, Juliet,” Mammon said, jostling her. Trying his best to quiet her clear distress. “Ya ain’t going anywhere, and the choice to make war or not ain’t up to you. So quit worryin’ ‘bout it.”

She lay her head back down on his chest, still deflated. “I love you too, StupidMammon.”

“I-if anything, I’m more worried about all those bruises! You gonna let me know what’s goin’ on so I can make sure you don’t go gettin’ yourself hurt again?” he asked.

“I mean, unless you’re into that?” He wiggled his eyebrows at her.

“Mammon!” she said, shoving at the shoulder under her. “Yes, clearly I wander around the house looking for ways to get bruised enough to have trouble standing. It’s not like I need to out run things that want to devour me or anything.”

“Pfft. You don’t have to run from anything with me here.” A hand wave dismissed her notion. “But, seriously, I know Asmo is mixed up in it based on your notes, but that doesn’t automatically explain you gettin’ injured while still in the house.”

“Mammon, I can’t figure out how to avoid war, what makes you think I can figure out how to avoid your brothers for more than a day?”

“Oh come on, other than Asmo they can’t be that bad. Yours truly excluded of course,” he said, his smile far too charming for the small space.

“Ah, yes, Asmo did say you were a beast.”

He blushed under her second hand praise. “Quit bein’ so stubborn and just tell me already,” he said instead of recognizing her words.

“Promise you won’t be mad?”

“Mad at you? Never.”

“Mammon, I can feel you crossing your fingers on my back.”

“I proooomise. Now confess your squishy, little, human soul to me!”

“You’re not allowed to go beating anyone up or kicking in doors.”

He lifted one of her arms and wiggled it between them. “Tell me who bruised you up and I’ll be content.”

“That is the biggest lie I think I’ve heard you tell yet,” she said, exasperated. “I don’t even count that one since it was due to magical compulsion.”

“That one?” he asked.

She looked away, both annoyed and self-conscious.

“Wha—How? Where are all the marks from before?” he asked, finally inspecting the now flawless arm he held.

“Magic.”

“You can’t do magic.”

“Potions?”

“You hate drinking them.”

“Cats.”

“You gonna keep lyin’ ta me? Or am I gonna have to shake it outta ya?” he asked, jostling her again.

She wiggled away, and he heard an indistinct noise grumbled into his solar plexus.

“You’re gonna hafta say that again up here.”

She raised herself up as much as she could in the tight space. Her discomfort was readily apparent. She didn’t look at him while she answered, “Beelzebub.”

“You’ve gotta be—” he yelled and sat up into the frame of the bed. The bed hopped, and Mammon lay back down, holding his hand to his brow.

“Oooh. That looked like it hurt. Let me see.” She tried to peel his hand away but he held it there, half covering his face.

“Are you messing with me? Beel?” he asked. “I will tear him limb from limb! He can’t go around touchin’ my human like that!”

“Mammon. Stay put. You promised.”

“I can’t let someone go manhandlin’ ya.”

“Mammoooon. It was probably just to heal me anyways. So, quit it. I’m tired of my trust being tested every day!” she said talking into his shirt again.

“Oi oi! You're not cryin’ are ya?”

“No, I’m not crying,” she grumped. “I think I’ve cried every day this week. I’m too tired to cry any more.”

“Well. Good,” he said, trying for ambivalence. “I can’t have you crying all over my jacket.”

“Yeah?” she asked, as he stroked her back.

“Shut up and enjoy being in the presence of The Great Mammon.”

They stayed like that until her D.D.D. flickered next to them: Asmodeus again. Mammon’s growl of displeasure let her know to hold the device out of his reach before he stole it away.

Judging by the pleased photos Asmodeus was sending, Lucifer was right. He did look like the cat who got the cream.

“He said he’s picking out my clothing for the party.”

“What else?”

“...”

“I can see that there’re more lines from here.”

“He’s going to pick something exceptionally skimpy because I didn’t join him.”

The bed jumped again.

“Mammon, stop that!”

“I need to go out. For a completely unrelated reason!”

“Mammon, you are not to beat up, or try to beat up your brothers,” she said calmly, still resting on his chest. It wasn't a command but she expected him to follow it anyway.

The noise of disgust made at the back of his throat was louder than he meant it to be. “Fine, then I’m allowed to be greedy with you right now.”

“I thought you already were?” She looked at his arms around her, his legs framing hers.

“Maybe, but I get it for longer then.”

“Okay, Mammon,” she said, laying her head back down. “Thank you for keeping me safe.”

His face burned with her praise and he held her tighter. What wouldn’t he do for this stupid human?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	44. Hidden Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone is finding unexpected things today it seems. Well, no, mostly just MC.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

Belphegor heard the door open and close with force.

It was difficult to think in the haze of sensation Beelzebub had created, but he tried to find the source of the noise. The sharp sound and small breeze had definitely not come from them.

'Maybe I can catch Beel unaware this time and just… Nope.' It was the fifth time he’d tried to sneak-sleep attack Beelzebub this morning and none of them had worked. 'Is he just eating more to withstand it? Or less?' Every time they ended in a deadlock, slowed but not completely frozen in place, and the only one who lost in that case was him.

The last thing he wanted was someone in the room with them, with him vulnerable like this, when he had slowed them both to almost nothing. Belphegor let go of the time around them, and Beelzebub ground his weight over him again in response. Harder, even, as if to remind him it was useless to resist.

Large hands pinned Belphegor's chest back down to the bed, as he tried to sit up and see the intruder, riding him closer to completion even in this distracted state.

His eyes followed the sound of the startled gasp and he was able to peek past the footboard of the bed. She was still gripping the doorknob, watching Beelzubub fuck himself on him.

“I’ve come at a bad time. I’ll just ask Satan!” she squeaked and was gone with a slam of the door.

The sound finally jarred Beelzebub and he opened his eyes in confusion.

“You moron. You didn’t lock the door,” Belphegor moaned.

“So?”

“She saw everything,” he said, the haze completely clearing as his stomach sunk.

“I still don’t think it’s such a big deal,” Beelzebub responded as he rolled off to the side. There was no point in continuing to sabotage Belphegor’s physical chances with her when he was already sabotaging himself mentally.

“We’ve been over this. Can you remember a single time when we visited the human world where women had more than one lover? No.”

“There were some older men who did. It could be possible. That was all a very long time ago.”

Belphegor dug the heels of his palms into his eyes. “No, Levi said, if anything, the humans have become more monogamous. I doubt she’d like your idea of a timeshare like a divorced couple’s dog.”

“Fine,” Beelzebub sighed, resigned to not winning this argument again. “Clean up and we’ll see if we can’t find her before she can think too much on it. It’s almost breakfast time anyways.”

They’d check with Satan. That’s where he’d heard her say she was headed, but she was already gone. The kitchen was empty too.

When he didn’t see her at breakfast, Belphegor knew it couldn’t just be a small shock. Was she repulsed by them now? Did she feel betrayed? He didn’t want to eat. Looking at Mammon’s fare it was obvious she’d designed the meal.

He pushed the food around on his plate before giving it to Beelzebub, so lost in thought he didn’t realize Asmodeus had already finished and excused himself.

“Split up?” he said over the table. It would mean nothing to Mammon or Satan. He left first after Beelzebub nodded and began to eat faster.

She wasn’t in her room either, but it was obvious she’d eaten there. He collected her bowl and brought it back to the sink. It was unlikely she'd left the house. Maybe he would try the attic next; it was the last place he would think to look for her, so the best place for her to hide away.

He should have known when he woke up next to Mammon instead of her that today wouldn’t go well.

* * *

Mammon always knew how to make her feel better… eventually. She wiggled out of his grasp as he started to nod off, his belly full and her body warming him back into sleep.

Grabbing his leg she dragged him out from under her bed as gently as she could. He hadn’t released her pillow during the trip and she tossed her comforter over him instead of waking him. Couldn’t have him sitting up into the frame again; it was likely he’d already broken it beyond repair. A weight test may be necessary after lunch.

At the door, she asked the lanterns politely to dim slowly to dark. There was no worry about him finding his way around when he woke. He could see in the dark.

She closed the door quietly and made her way back to the kitchen. It was already almost eleven, and she hoped to get a nice cup of tea, and wend her way to the library for some quiet time and a book, without any more contemplation.

The designated tea cupboards were fairly evenly divided by their doors, and she opened the human safe door only to immediately close it. She swallowed and shook her head. Maybe she was actually still asleep under the bed with Mammon.

Opening it again she was greeted by two glowing eyes. Green lit and pushing tea out of its way as it approached her.

It’s fur was thick and black, claws and fangs obvious as it tapped closer into the warm light of the kitchen.

“Prrraawww” grumbled out of it, the noise rising in question.

“Well, aren’t you just a little darling. Please don’t eat me and let me pet you instead?”

The kitten hopped out of the cupboard and she scrambled to try and catch it before it landed far below on the hard floor. A soft ‘wumph wumph’ above her crouched position made her aware of her ridiculousness.

Of course it had bat wings. Why wouldn’t she have assumed that a tea kitten had bat wings.

She stood as it landed on the counter and paced, letting out little mews. Why were all the dangerous things so cute?

“Are you hungry?”

High pitched yowls made her think that must mean ‘yes’.

‘Can demon cats understand me or is it the same level as regular cats?’ she wondered while opening the fridge.

“It’s your lucky day: looks like we still have some leftover octopus. Well, baby kraken tentacles, I guess. Can you eat that?”

Sharp and enthusiastic “mehk mehk mehk’s met her question so she collected the remains and set about mincing them finely.

Tiny needle claws landed on her shoulder, watching her work. The thickness of her shirt removed any real discomfort.

However, a deep baritone interrupted her train of thought, “And here I thought you’d finally learned how to lie convincingly.”

She looked up, knife in hand, to find Lucifer scrutinizing her, and her newly collected demon pet.

“I thought you would be with Diavolo the rest of the day?” she asked, trying to keep her eyes on transferring the mince to a bowl.

The cat flapped its wings uncomfortably at him when he strode towards them to inspect more closely. She set the food on the floor, allowing it to escape his perusal and eat.

“We finished our agenda more quickly than anticipated. I returned to collect more work.”

“Tsk tsk,” she said. “You set yourself such a grueling pace.”

“You’ve never complained before,” he said, and she did her best not to rise to the bait.

“You can keep the cat for now,” he continued, when it was clear she wasn’t going to offer him any further banter. “Right now, it looks like Mammon is about to get up to something worse than anything your pantheptera could do. Excuse me.”

She stood still, surprised the storm had passed her by and that she remained in relative calm. Resisting the urge to find out what Mammon could have been doing to provoke such an immediate chase, she quickly washed up the prep area and the licked-clean bowl. Soon enough they were on their way to the library.

“Satan! The tea fairy left me a kitten!” she said by way of greeting.

His face blanched, distress obvious from his head to his toes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	45. Rancor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC really does intend to start getting some information about things...
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

“You have to hide her!” Satan hissed. “Lucifer came home unexpectedly.”

“I know.”

“Well then why did you take her out of the cupboard!”

“She was hungry.” She blinked at him like he had forgotten two plus two. “Lucifer said I could keep her before he ran after Mammon.”

Her finger helped him close his mouth from the guppy expression he was gawping, which only seemed to shock him further.

Kitten in one arm, she reached past him for her previous book. It had made its way back to the table without her walking it over. She assumed that meant she was requested for more tandem reading.

She sat next to him, near but not touching, and let the kitten traverse the couch unfettered.

“How did you—” he began to say before the main door opened and revealed the devil himself.

“Satan, you know you can’t keep it,” was all Lucifer said before turning to leave, his pivot revealing both Mammon and Beelzebub behind him.

“You can’t give and then take away!” she called to his back.

The outright grin he gave her when he turned was enough to shut her up momentarily. ‘I most certainly can and have,’ that look said. “It’ll overrun us if it stays too long,” he said instead. The logic of his words barely scraped the surface of her full body flush.

“It’s not a tribble,” she said, mostly to herself.

The confused stares she received from four sets of eyes made her realize that only Leviathan might have had a chance of understanding her meaning.

“It’s a bobtailed pantheptera,” Satan told him. “It shouldn’t duplicate.”

“Shouldn’t?”

She could feel the tension in the room rising and she crossed one leg over the other to hide her hand landing gently on Satan’s thigh. The staring contest ended.

“I’ve already named her,” she said, feigning a pout. “But we can argue about Rancor when you return. I’m sure you’re already late as it is.”

The twitch of Lucifer's fingers at his side was almost imperceptible. “Very well. It can stay until you’re finished healing.”

Nods all around, and the door closed. She melted into the couch and removed her hand from Satan’s leg.

‘Now who can’t convincingly lie!’ she thought. “Ugh. You’re one lucky cat,” she said.

“Rancor?” Satan asked.

She nodded. “That’s what she said when I asked.”

“Doesn’t seem to fit her very well,” he muttered, raising his book back up. Clearly, she thought it funny to tease him about understanding panthepteras.

A soft yowl sounded behind them, and she tried to hide her smile behind her own book. The kitten continued to rampage over furniture, tumbling and turning in the air, herding the Little Demons under the couch more than once.

She held her book one handed, waiting to see if Satan would say anything about her Sin Theory, but a deeper growl from Rancor drew her attention away from the printed words and her psychological thoughts.

Belphegor had entered and shuffled sleepily towards them, pillow in hand. “Beel tells me I have you to thank for this new fluffy cloud,” he said to Satan.

“Ah, a fan gave it to me,” Satan replied as Belphegor drew up to the couch backing.

“So much for that,” she murmured to Satan, lowering her reading material. “You barely use sheets.”

He hadn’t put his book down yet and she couldn’t be sure if her jab about his nakedness this morning had landed or not.

Rancor had decided to keep herself between Belphegor and the-human-that-feeds.

“You should come help me test it out,” he tried to invite her, but was met with a tiny hiss from the pantheptera.

He narrowed his eyes at Rancor and she skittered closer to her newest feeder, only to draw her wings out in full, spitting.

“Oh my,” she said, trying to lift the kitten from the back of the couch. “He could gobble you up, shush.”

Rancor unhooked her claws, but still sent tiny, nasty rumbles Belphegor’s way.

“I’m sorry, Belphie,” she said, focusing on settling the kitten in her lap. “I just finished resting. Maybe after lunch?”

“If it’s the pantheptera you’re worried about…” he started.

“No, no. She’s fine. She’ll settle. I really did just—”

But he was already reaching forward. “I can just give her a cat nap.”

The guttural pops and hisses that came from the flattened eared kitten in her lap grew stronger the nearer his hand drew.

Even Satan was beginning to shift uncomfortably.

“Belphie, quit it,” she said.

He paused.

“It won’t harm her,” he said, moving the final few inches toward the fangs bared at him.

She grabbed his forearm instead and felt her consciousness spin. The world dipped and grew darker. Only a little point of light ahead of her remained visible. Was that her breathing so slow around her?

Her chest grew tighter. Satan had let out some sort of noise and she sat upright, furious.

“WHAT DID I JUST SAY?”

“Okay! Okay!” Belphegor said, dropping to a knee behind the couch, her hand still gripping harshly around part of his forearm. “I won’t touch the cat.”

A fearful purr in her lap drew her attention away. She released the grip on Belphegor’s arm and the one she’d accidentally dug into Satan’s thigh, as she brought over both hands to comfort the shaking creature.

She could only manage a momentary pet between its wings before she collapsed sideways into Satan’s lap.

Satan’s book was above his shoulder, raised in the air as she fell over him. He wasn’t entirely sure what to do. He wanted to shake her to wake her, but tiny meows permeated the air once Belphegor sat back and out of sight.

About to lift her away from the ailing human, the pantheptera edged closer to the human’s stomach instead, and escaped his soft grasp by headbutting under the limp human arm in front of her. The pitiful mews continued from where he couldn’t reach her, not without rolling her new shelter.

He’d thought he’d been distressed before, when she walked into the library with the pantheptera, but this was much more stressful. He almost wished Lucifer had forgotten something and would come back through the doors.

The kitten’s cries, and Belphegor's cursing, stopped simultaneously when a comforting sound like wind chimes left the human across his thighs.

With wonder, Satan watched as the kitten turned around under her arm, folded its wings and sat, silently glaring up at Belphegor, who was quickly standing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	46. Private Conference

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two sets of conferences take place.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

“So she really did have a cat,” Mammon said as they made their way to the main gate.

Lucifer gave him nothing in response.

“Can we actually keep it?” Beelzebub asked, thumbs busy sending a message to his twin about their human’s whereabouts.

Still nothing from Lucifer in reply.

“Hey. You sure she won’t be mad at us talkin’ ‘bout this stuff with Diavolo?” Mammon asked.

“Does it matter if she is?” Lucifer finally answered.

Mammon stuck his hands in his pockets, following along and entering the waiting carriage. “Yah, I hate when she’s right too.”

* * *

“Ah! What in the twenty-three levels was that?” Belphegor snapped, holding his arm, pillow forgotten on the floor.

“I-I don’t know,” Satan said. He watched her closely and nearly recoiled when she pacified her newest familiar again.

“Yeah, she’s been doing that,” Belphegor said while he turned his arm over for inspection. “Satan, she managed to bruise me.”

Belphegor was reticent to share information, but their human suddenly being able to bring him low was something that required conversation with the resident detective.

“Mammon actually had me looking into some unusual happenings with her recently.” Satan poked her shoulder with no response. “I would say this fits the pattern,” he hummed thoughtfully to himself.

“She’s been gaining demonic strength and crushing Mammon while her eyes spit fire? No, that’s something he would have definitely brought up! He’d never be able to keep it to himself,” Belphegor countered, immediately.

“Her eyes did what?”

“I don’t know, but they weren’t human-normal.”

Satan tapped his fingers. “Well, that is new and unexpected…but could still fit the pattern. She was touching me when it happened. And she did seem emotionally distressed.”

“Could you speak plainly.”

Belphegor’s lack of inflection created much more of an irritated statement than question, and Satan tried not to let it get under his skin. He needed to stay calm to think clearly. “We believe that when she’s overwrought there’s some sinful bleed if she’s in contact with one of us. It would explain a number of interactions that were out of the ordinary for her." Satan frowned as he looked down at her again. "But it’s usually stealing Leviathan’s ice cream cone or nearly throwing something at Mammon, not…Well, I suppose for one not used to fury, it could be easy to overdo it.”

“So this has happened before?”

“It was hypothetical before, but I think we’ve just seen it in action. I admit, I felt drowsy until she took her nails out of my leg.”

“But, she’ll be okay? She’ll wake up? I can’t feel her sleeping,” Belphegor tried to keep the fear from creeping into his voice.

“She should wake once she has the worst of it out of her system. She likely just shut off again to avoid injuring you further. If it’s still there, I’ll take her to the breaking room.”

“Are you messing with me?”

“She slept quite a bit over the weekend if you recall? Usually, it was whenever she made contact with Leviathan after the lust bleed over. She tested it herself and would drop unconscious rather than infringe upon us. It was quite fascinating.”

They stared at her for a short time, saying nothing.

Belphegor cleared his throat. “I, um, I’ve heard her speak Celestial once before.” He tried not to let his trepidation get in the way. This was serious; his plans would have to move to the back burner again. There could be something wrong.

Eyebrows raised in curiosity, Satan waited impatiently for his youngest brother to speak up.

“I would say she was emotional then, but she didn’t notice any difference.”

“Interesting. Were you arguing about something?”

“Yes, I guess you could say it was an argument.”

“Is it something she would be embarrassed about such that you can’t, or won’t, tell me?”

“Yep,” Belphegor answered, letting the ‘p’ pop loudly as he looked away.

“Right then, sex.”

“Well, you guessed so I didn’t tell.” He shrugged his shoulders. He’d prefer if everyone knew, then maybe they wouldn’t be as cozy with her.

“But that doesn’t explain how she knows it. Earlier today, she shook one of my Little Demons and told it not to lie in front of her.”

“Ah, well, that part might be my fault,” Belphegor volunteered, his voice regaining more of its apathy. “We practiced listening exercises. She caught on much faster than expected.”

“Apparently.”

They both stared at her, uncertain of what to say next.

“Well,” Satan offered, “there’s at least precedent for humans of Celestial lineage learning the language, but the transference of power, even minor and unintended, is unique...And concerning.”

The kitten purred loudly as the human around her stirred.

Belphegor poked her arm without imbuing it with any power, and he watched her slump into unconsciousness again. 'She's still angry.' His stomach dropped.

He tried to make light of her reaction, but his disappointment must have been more than his usual despondency if Satan’s concerned reaction was anything to go by. “She survived here and brought us back together. I doubt there’s a single normal thing about her."

I’ll duck out and to avoid riling her again. Keep an eye on her,” Belphegor said, collecting the pillow and storming out before Satan could ask anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A giant thank you to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	47. Familiar Affection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC wakes up disoriented but Satan has kept her company.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

She woke slowly, feeling disoriented but not unsafe. It was warm and quiet. The fire still crackled nearby.

“You truly are something else,” she heard above her. It was Satan. She was snuggled up on his lap as he read a book with his arms around her, as if it were still Sunday.

But there was purring in her lap which meant that it was definitely Tuesday. Chocolate making day. Valentine’s Day. She was supposed to go check on Leviathan.

“I didn’t mean to nod off. I’m not sure...” she trailed off, trying to remember when she had moved to his lap.

“Well, I’ll forgive you this time,” he answered and squeezed her lightly.

Her heart fluttered at the unfamiliar affection and she lay her head back down against his shoulder to hide her confusion.

“You’ve had a tough few days. I think you’ve earned the rest,” he said, though he suspected he hardly knew half of it.

It was difficult not to hold her more snugly when he could feel her eyelashes flit over the skin of his neck. She’d always been an oddity, then a mystery as she collected their pacts, and now she was something else. She had a mind for knowledge and a literal body for sin: a temptation coated in layers of invitation for him.

The appeal of stealing her away to see just how much sin she could hold was great, but the way she relaxed back into him and the soft purr coming from her lap kept him in place. After all, everyone knew it was bad luck to disturb a pantheptera, and this one was exceptionally cute. He wasn’t sure he could withstand the combined frowns of both ladies in his lap.

“Satan? Is there a way to lock a door magically?”

He set down his book. A smile on his face and mischief in his heart.

* * *

Satan’s questions had been precise in narrowing down the spell she needed and they secluded themselves in his room to find an old, blue book with margins scribbled full of notes.

He was kind enough to write it into something functional for her rather than letting her curse him into morning workouts with Beelzebub when she realized it needed magic to operate. He built a human “post-it note” as she called it, which said keep out and would enforce its mandate.

It was never asked outright what it was for but he had his suspicions. When she asked if there was a way for it to allow passage for some and not others he gave her a knowing grin.

“Like Rancor or Leviathan,” she specified

Altering it wasn’t hard and he taught her how to alter it further if need be; it was even reusable, which he could tell she appreciated.

She tucked it in her back pocket, relieved to have another option.

It had only been a few days since she had asked Lucifer for a key to her room, and she trusted he would get it to her soon, but it never hurt to have something extra available. Besides, it was nice to be able to depend on Satan too.

Rancor pounced on her from above and took her off her feet.

“For something so small, you sure pack a punch!” she giggled into the furry belly she now held overhead. The force of the collision had knocked her backwards onto Satan’s messy bed. Thankfully, all claws had been safely hidden away.

It was obvious from the way he fidgeted that Satan was uncomfortable with their landing pad, so she sat up while she focused solely on her new furry friend. “Aren’t you just the cutest!” she baby-talked it and petted, before standing with Rancor purring away in her arms.

Satan looked away, returning his attention to something riveting on his bookshelf.

“Is everything okay?” she asked, when she noticed his frustration continuing to rise. It didn’t seem as bad as the time Leviathan spilled tea all over him, but still more than when he didn’t have time to finish a compelling chapter. He glowed faintly.

She swallowed her trepidation, and hoped it wasn’t obvious that she kept Rancor between them as she approached.

A smooch to the kitten when it trembled, and she swore the glowing intensified for a moment. Her hand reached out to rest on the folded arm closest to her. “Satan, are you angry with me about something?”

It was difficult not to nuzzle the kitten as it tried to climb away. She blew warm air against Rancor’s belly as she made it to her shoulder. The energy pulsed angrily again and Rancor curled around the back of her neck like a little collar.

She pulled his arm out from under the other arm.

“Nothing to worry about,” he said, smiling.

Sometimes he could be an even worse liar than Mammon. She shuffled closer to his side.

“You know that smile doesn’t work with me,” she said quietly.

A tired frown replaced it and he shrugged. “It’s nothing,” he reiterated, his cheeks rosy.

A gentle stroke to the kitten and she watched his eyes follow her movements assiduously. Maybe she was beginning to understand them better, beyond just the fuzzy images they pushed at her.

“Rancor,” she whispered, “can you tell me how many Little Demons are in the room without eating them?”

No scratches circled her neck where the kitten pushed off. She chattered loudly while hunting her newest prey.

“Satan, are you jealous of my attention to Rancor?” she asked softly.

“That’s Leviathan’s thing,” he said, as if that settled it. Her hand remained on his arm even as he tried to refold it across his chest.

“Are you frustrated then, that all my attention is on her?”

His chin lifted slightly, but he couldn’t manage the haughtiness in his voice he meant to project. “That would be very childish.”

She wouldn’t tease him the way she would Mammon; he’d be stubborn enough to spurn her on principle. She hugged him instead and said nothing.

“I’m not a child,” he reminded her.

“I know.”

“Are you trying to cheer me up?”

“Is it working?”

That he had to pause and contemplate told her it was working. She raised up on her tiptoes while his eyes and thoughts were far away.

The stunned look on his face when she kissed his cheek was priceless.

“Would you like another?” she asked.

He cleared his throat. “Your thanks for the spell is not necessary,” he said, but his blush was brighter than before.

“Well, I can’t leave you uneven,” she said, mocking indignation as she turned him in her arms to procure his other cheek.

All of the anger had left his eyes, she noted. “Thank you for looking after me again today. I feel like my nap wasn’t normal... So, thank you. I appreciate being able to depend on you.”

“May I?” he asked, cupping her cheek instead of responding to her thanks.

“Always the gentleman,” she smiled, looking up at him. “Please do.”

This time his free arm encompassed her as he sealed their lips together. Her eyes fluttered shut even though the kiss was chaste. ‘A small show of affection is manageable,’ she thought, ‘The world won’t crash around us because we pressed lips.’

He pulled away, eyes still closed. It was probably best not to strain her any further today, if her previous outburst was anything to go by. Not that it was easy to part from her when she'd so willingly defused him. “Isn't it about time you took care of your tasks?” he asked.

“Is that what we’re calling you now?” she said and leaned back in to kiss him properly.

She didn’t expect the strength with which he seized her or the kiss. Maybe this was a little bit more than she’d bargained for. Wasn’t it just uncovering what had already been there between them though?

If he hadn’t been holding her, she would have fallen into a stack of books. He let her breathe once the world started to spin, and it was her turn to be staggered.

“Where has that been hiding?” she whispered against his lips, their breaths mingling while she decided whether to make the incremental move forward to taste more.

Her eyes half closed and heart striking exceptionally loud, she wondered if the beat of it would be enough to thud her the rest of the distance forward on its own.

“Usually behind sweaters,” he said, but she could feel the warmth behind his cheekiness.

He loosened his hold on her.

“It’s a shame I can’t stay to help you remove that further,” she said, “however, you’re correct, I am promised elsewhere.”

“Hmm. Then I’ll have to set you free for now.”

Her hand slid down to his and he looked at them thoughtfully. “I am content with how things are either way,” he said, pulling her hand back up around his neck. “I’ll happily read with you every day, but I hope you’ll think of me should you need more.”

The way he stretched her up along the length of his body was enticing, even if he was being a shining knight about it.

She balanced against him, brushing her fingertips along his neck and into the soft, short hairs she could barely reach, with her other hand molded to the planes of his chest. The shiver that travelled through him was enjoyable against her body.

Lifting her hand higher, he spun her to face away from him and towards the door.

As good as she felt pressed against him this way, his hand flat against the heat of her stomach, she did have somewhere to be, and the last thing he needed was for Leviathan to flood his bedroom today.

“Off you go,” he said and she walked slowly towards his door.

A black blur almost toppled her again, but she ducked in time. Rancor circled to land on her shoulder and chatter. They both looked back at him conspiratorially.

“She says you have six.”

She crossed the threshold and Rancor kicked off her, alighting on Satan’s bed. He joined the pantheptera on the safety of the mattress. Their human certainly knew how to pique his curiosity and ire in equal measures.

When she closed the door it was to the sound of Satan trying to stifle grunts of pain as an overeager kitten paced his back, kneading it with her claws, still vertical.

* * *

“Six,” he muttered to himself. Now he knew she was playing with him. “She doesn’t know what she’s talking about, does she,” he cooed to the winged feline.

He lay back to stare at his ceiling and debated if he should go collect his novel from the other room or stay a little longer and remember the feeling of her under his hands and in his mouth.

A thunk on the bed drew his attention before he had decided. It was a very bitter Little Demon, shaking its fist in the air.

Soon, another, and then another joined it. If they became a mob he’d have to take their pitchforks away just to keep the fight even, but he knew he only had four in this general area. It wouldn't be much of a problem so long as Rancor remained airborne.

A half dozen of them protested, and jumped loudly around him, before Rancor was done hunting. She circled overhead, trilling victoriously.

A feeling of unease overtook him. ‘Just what are we dealing with?’ he wondered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks again to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	48. My Valentine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get a bit... out of control on Valentine's Day in an unexpected way.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

She must have slept for quite some time because it was well past lunch when she woke. Thankfully, with four of the boys out of the house, it meant that even waking late she could expect there to still be food in the kitchen.

Snacking while she filled a small gift box with her chocolates, she debated whether she was playing with fire in kissing Satan, but after her talk with Mammon, her rationale for not reciprocating affections seemed weak.

She hated to think about giving away her chance to influence the worlds when she seemed to have so little power otherwise, but he was right: the balance of power in the three realms wasn’t her responsibility. What happened would happen. It wasn’t as if Barbatos wasn’t divining all of it anyway.

If anything, she should only be worrying about right now. That was already more than enough. And, right now, nothing had actually changed. Everyone’s feelings were still the same, just acknowledged instead of ignored. She let that sink in and tried to allow the weight of her old thoughts to roll off her shoulders.

Fishing out a sealable plastic bag, she made her way out of the kitchen and around to her room to write. If she was going to deliver a “confession” with the chocolates, and he wasn’t going to come out, then she was going to waterproof it and stuff it under the door.

It didn’t take long to pen and she trusted the seal on the bag. She put a bathing suit on beneath her clothing and collected a towel. If all else failed, she’d lure him out with pool time.

Marching down the halls, she passed Beelzebub and Belphegor’s room, and was glad not to be in just a towel this time. She took a deep breath and kept walking.

‘One bit of crazy at a time. Pace yourself, girl,’ she coached. ‘Still gotta drag Levi out of his lair.’

She knocked politely on Leviathan’s door. No answer.

She messaged him. No answer.

She called on the D.D.D. and heard it ring from inside his room. No answer.

“Levia-chan. Come out! It’s Valentine’s Day, and I have chocolate for you, as promised!”

Still nothing. Should she order him to open the door? That was her usual Modus Operandi; ignore their complaints and do what is best. Ugh, she was starting to sound like Lucifer. That sidelined that idea pretty quickly.

She pushed the sealed note under the door and felt the water lapping at her fingers as she did. That couldn’t be good for the flooring. Or his electronics.

“Levi, I’m going to the pool and I hope you’ll join me!”

It was hard not to be discouraged when the tips of the bag didn’t disappear from her side of the door. Pool time it was. She’d just have to be patient.

She shucked off her clothing once past the pool room door, tossing them and her towel over the lounge chairs. It was difficult not to be annoyed at Leviathan’s pool rules for her, but a promise was a promise, and she fitted herself with water wings. The inflatable tube was more difficult to wiggle down to her waist.

Belatedly, she realized she was going to have to have someone cut her out of it…or use a lot of butter. Thoughts of Beelzebub helping her wiggle out and clean up rushed through her mind and she rushed them right back out. ‘One clingy, confusing demon at a time, brain!’

Fully outfitted, she stepped into the smaller, warm pool, walking down the gradient until the flotation tube at her waist bobbed on the surface.

‘Did he make me promise to wear these because he knew it was impossible to swim in?’ she wondered. ‘It is a pretty effective way of ensuring I don’t swim without him.’

She sighed and paddled around like a toddler until the door flew open, cracking the wall behind it.

* * *

The plastic bag stared at him judgmentally from its place under his door. Eventually, when he was certain she was gone, he crawled out of his tub to retrieve it.

Dear Leviathan,

Please accept this chocolate.  
I made them with you in mind.  
I hope you will let me be your Player 2 forever.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

P.S. Meet me for swimming before dinner?  
P.P.S. If you’re reading this. I’m already in the pool.  
P.P.P.S. I definitely think you’re Dino-mite. 🦖

He cracked the door open and retrieved the small shiny box. He ripped the bowed ribbon and top off with his teeth and spat them away. At least this time when she lied it meant she gave him more than one chocolate. Any other time he would have marvelled at the different colours and flavours she’d managed to pack into one box. He tossed the box and the note onto his desk and strode angrily to the pool.

He heard the wall behind the pool door crack before the door swung back to close on him.  
‘So uncool.’ The thought only fueled his anger. This was her fault.

Pressing the door to the wall this time, he stepped through and she was already making her way towards him, smile as brilliant as ever.

It faltered at the same time her step did, when she took in his shaking fists and lashing tail. Her retreat only provoked him further. It didn’t matter though, she wouldn’t be able to escape, especially not in that direction.

The water began to swirl around her knees and she stumbled backwards.

“I’m not letting you get away!”

“Levi?” she asked, the fear evident in the quiver of her voice. “What’s wrong? You’re scaring me.”

He grabbed her arm and dragged her further into the water. “Good. You should be afraid,” he growled.

At first she had flailed and fought against his march into the deep, but after a few steps she went limp.

“You’re not allowed to cry when you’re the bad friend,” he shouted at her when he finally looked back. She hadn’t made a sound but he could see the tear tracks. He took his fingers out of her skin and knew it would bruise deeply.

“All I did was make chocolate for you. Could you please tell me why you’re so angry?”

“Oh, like you don’t know!”

The water churned, waves striking one another and frothing. They weren’t large enough to fully toss her, but she struggled without him. Good.

“ **Explain** ,” she shouted the invocation, spitting out water and blinded by hair.

The rage in his face as he tried to disobey her was terrifying.

“You’re always with everyone else,” he spat as he walked across the water that had pushed between them.

“They always have your attention! They can go out with you! They do more than watch movies with you!”

Every step a new accusation.

He yanked her up by her wrist, dangling her above the deep water below, and drove his nails into the floating ring around her waist. It exploded and tore.

Her eyes grew wide at the nails that had become longer and sharper, blue and taking up her focus entirely. She didn’t notice the deflated rubber tube fall away.

“You lie!” he hissed next to her face.

The sound of the waves thundered against the walls. It was then that he saw the actual panic in her. The water was high enough and he tossed her towards the door. “Run then,” he said.

‘Jealousy.’ She felt it from him all the way into her bones. ‘If they come to rescue me this will only get worse,’ she realized. Spurred on by the betrayed vibration of his words through the water, she dived through the lounge area mess for her pants that had yet to wash away.

He watched her crawl and scramble to the floor like the good-for-nothing human she was, not even worth watching run. Geisers of water shot up near him when he looked away, and the pools continued to swell and overflow into one another.

A blaze of green light and he jerked his attention back to her, palm flat over a piece of parchment and the door. Based on the soft glow that remained there, some sort of runes were acting on the door.

He watched as she turned away from the exit, the light now unimportant in his mind. She turned and ripped off her floaty wings, tossing them down in her own anger.

“Alright!” she shouted over the noise of the water that boiled around her, “I’ve locked them out. It’s just you and me now.”

His confusion surfaced when she began wading towards him, intense and fixated on him.

Waves struck her, even without his direction, and she coughed but continued moving towards him. She stopped only when she couldn’t get any closer.

“Shut up or put up your complaints clearly! You’re being a little bitch!” she shouted and pointed fiercely at him.

He held her above the water by her throat before she could blink the water from her eyes. His nails were still long and lethal, and the weight of her body strained the connections of her upper spine.

“I could kill you,” he snarled, his tail cracking violently near her face.

She wrenched his other hand up to her chest, pointing the nails over her heart. “My demons are the _only_ ones allowed to kill me,” she rasped and her words were every bit as vicious as his.

The wall behind them exploded and Satan stepped through it, Belphegor close behind, his tired eyes opening wide as the water sloshed up to his knees and his eyes met hers. The thundering of the waves had brought them running.

‘Right, it only works on doors,’ she thought belatedly.

Leviathan’s nails punctured into the back of her neck. She twisted in his grip anyways to command them better, feeling the sting of the points burning as she did.

“ **GET OUT AND STAY OUT!** ”

She saw them fly back to the other side of the hole in the wall. They would pace and stare there until she won or was a floating corpse.

'Fuck.' She hoped she didn’t die here. She hoped that Satan wouldn’t kill her afterwards for this too.

Turning back to Leviathan, she watched the rage die down into confusion.

The water was sinking them down into the pool, and she tried not to panic.

Soon they were looking up as they were sucked into the bottom of the deep end, water swirling and towering around them. 

Leviathan loosened his grip around her neck, but she didn’t remove his hand from her heart.

“I saw you,” he said, his focus broken as he pulled the water toward him. It came in small streams, but rapidly returned and spun faster round them. “It’s your fault,” he said, his accompanying growls still petulant.

“What is my fault?” she asked, trying not to let her own anger cripple their conversation.

“Everything is your fault!”

His face was inches from hers and she swore his teeth were pointier than before.

‘Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. Don’t murder him…Fuck it!’ Her hands, holding his personal daggers to her chest, shook with her anger. “Yes, it's my fault that you’re acting like a total jerk. I'm the dickhead fairy and I sprinkled asshole dust on your head when you weren't looking!”

He reared back at that, but she wouldn’t let go of his hand.

“How am I to blame for you being a shitty friend?” He gesticulated with his free hand and tail. “Ever since we met, I've known that this, us, we’re special. It's different than with everyone else. I will never meet anyone I can trust like I trusted you."

She was trying her best to let him vent it all out, but it was difficult not to throttle him within an inch of his little fishy life for this tantrum.

“You were my Henry! Most people will search their whole lives to find what I had. And you threw it all away to suck face with Beel!”

Her eye twitched. “How could I tell you about Beel if you wouldn’t let me talk to you, you fucking tadpole! You’re my best friend! How do you think I felt being cut out for days?”

He froze for a moment and she could feel the water change direction along the soles of her feet. They were moving again. Up? Closer to the shallows, she hoped.

“You could have messaged me! You could not play favourites when you promised you wouldn’t!”

“And you could have answered any of my bajillion messages so I could come talk to you about it in person!”

“Tch.”

She jabbed him hard in the stomach. It probably only hurt her finger, but at least he looked at her. The intensity of his jealousy was still very evident.

“What do you want?” she asked lowly, seriously. “What is the outcome you want?”

He glared at her. Clearly, he thought she ought to know, even if he didn’t know himself. An opportune swell of water flowed under her taking her almost eye level with Leviathan.

“Tell me everything you need,” she begged, cupping his face in her hands. “I don’t want to compel you.

He flinched under her watery gaze. Or maybe it was just that they were touching. His tail had curled round them both, cinching her to him.

“Don’t leave me behind for them.” The words were inaudible with the water around them. Without her skin on his she wouldn’t have been able to feel the explanatory tremor between their bodies.

“I’d never,” she promised. “You’ll always be mine.”

Messily, he crashed his mouth into hers. She felt the water cascading around them, falling from the breaking ridge above them. Shock from his advance and the deluge should have broken them apart, but she was still tightly held in place by his tail and his hand fisted under both straps at the front of her bathing suit.

He pressed all of his anger and jealousy and anxiety into her mouth, and her soft hands on his cheeks never wavered, even as he bent her back uncomfortably.

Collapsing to his knees, he took her down with him. She toppled backwards under his weight.

On the soft slope of the shallow end, Leviathan covered her body with his, hiding in the crook of her neck. Her hands stroked his back and petted his hair, soothing his fears.

“I could have killed you,” he croaked.

“My sweet pollywog,” she said so that only he could hear, “I think you know I would have kicked down the Celestial gates and dived right back into Hell to beat the snot out of you.”

She couldn’t tell if he was laughing or crying, but he held her tighter still. Her eyes met the figures still straining to enter the hole in the wall.

“Take me to your room?” she asked.

He nodded and sniffled before he scooped her up. When he paused, uncertain whether to make for the door or the crater in the wall, she reached for the parchment and he changed course.

It peeled off under her hand without any resistance.

A hand up stopped Satan and Belphegor from crowding them. “You owe me a towel,” was the only thing any of them heard her say before Leviathan kicked his bedroom door closed behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks again to Dalektable for their fearless trudging through my rough draft to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	49. Temporary Tattoos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time to soothe some jittery nerves.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

“Are you okay?” he asked as he stepped into his bathtub with her.

“This seems familiar,” she said as he settled them over the cushions and blankets, her back to his chest.

“I’m sorry,” he said against the bleeding pinpoints on the back of her neck.

“Are we okay?” she asked, trying to turn to face him.

He kissed her again by way of answer. It was a little more confident and well aimed than the last time, and she didn’t push him away, even when his tail wrapped along her leg.

“Eee! That’s ticklish!” She broke away laughing. His startled expression only made her laugh harder. “My foot! Quit it!”

His tail dragged as it retreated up her leg, and she tried not to shudder at the interesting sliding sensation.

The chuckle behind her was relieved and amused. “Well, at least it’s not just me.”

They rested like that for she didn’t know how long, content with small, comforting touches and warmth, but eventually, the buzzing of Leviathan’s D.D.D. interrupted the restructuring of their trust.

The number of messages were in the hundreds if the constant noise was anything to go by. Eventually, he had to answer it.

The most pressing one was answered first in the main chat: yes, the human was still alive and well. No, he had not eaten her soul or broken any bones. He sent them a selfie and tried not to blush when he saw it in the chat: Her sitting in his tub, in his lap, in only her bathing suit, reclining happily against his bare chest, flashing them a grin and a peace sign.

Satan was the first to chime in that the image could have been taken over the weekend. Which only resulted in a flurry of additional messages from the other brothers who were unaware of where her magical narcolepsy had begun.

They required video.

He huffed grumpily and she just laughed.

It was her turn to hold the D.D.D. and he hit record.

“I’m alive and here voluntarily,” she promised with a wave and a smile in the dark room, but the look of shock on her face was still easily recognizable in the dim light when Leviathan moved forward and pressed his lips to her cheek.

He grinned at the camera and sent the recording.

She laughed and let it slide. 'One bit of crazy at a time.' This emergency felt only half over.

Eventually, she squirmed in his lap until he helped her turn around. “So, I was serious, what do you need to be happy?” she asked.

Red rushed up to flood his entire face, and when she reached to touch his cheek and calm him, he shied away.

“I know I kissed you…” he trailed off.

“Three times,” she corrected.

“Uhm. I kissed you three times, but…this is—” He wasn’t looking at her. “I want the world to know we’re...connected, but I’m not used to this much touching. I’m not sure I can…”

“I see,” she said, thinking for a moment. “Hold that thought. I’ll be right back.”

Hauling herself out of the tub without stepping on him, she walked out his door, and ran as quickly as her wobbly legs would allow.

‘I should have known,’ she groaned to herself when Lucifer appeared in front of her. ‘Dinner must already be done.’

“Sorry about the pool!” she puffed cheerfully, and tried to zoom around him to her own door.

His hand around her bicep produced a high pitched yelp, and she dropped to the carpet next to him. She was happy to notice he had removed his hand as if she’d burned him.

Gathering herself upright again, she made eye contact, and shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t have time for this. “On a mission,” was her explanation, and she disappeared behind him into her room.

She left just as quickly, swerving around him, and running back in the direction of the pool and Leviathan.

The floor in Leviathan’s room was still slick, and she almost ate tile when she slid through the door, but she kicked the door shut and strode straight to his bathroom. A head tilt was his only indication he should follow.

“W-what are you doing in my shower?” he asked, looking up at the bathroom ceiling instead of at her under the slowly warming stream of water.

“Making sure I can wear your marks,” she said with surety.

He could hear her smile in her words and his mouth went dry.

“Not like that, my gorgeous nerd. Get in here.”

If he could have, he would have sunk into the grout of the tiles and stained it pink. Squares of paper littered his counter, but his eyes were glued to her as she warmed back up under the water.

“Enough ogling,” she said playfully, “pick out a tattoo.”

Looking back to the counter, he realized the paper had little sea creatures printed all over them. “When did you—”

“We were in London and saw the London Eye. I found them there and thought of you. So, I brought them home.”

“Did you really think I'd like that?” he scoffed.

Her disappointed “Oh, I guess I just hoped...” had him backpedaling immediately.

“Ah, no, I'm sorry! I didn’t mean it,” he said, tearing open the packaging.

An octopus picture was squished between his fingers and he held it out to her.

“Where do you want it?” she asked without innuendo, looking across her own body and back to him.

His mouth was an ‘o’ but his eyes travelled to her hip.

She took the paper from him, peeled back the cover and put it back in his hands.

Entranced, he watched her guide his hand to her side and press the square and his hand to her.

Angling the water over it, she held his hand there for a minute.

He wasn’t sure he remembered to breathe; maybe he was only absorbing air through the water on his hand.

“Check and see if it adhered okay?”

Fingers trembling, he peeled it back a fraction and then completely off.

The bashful smile he gave her was worth running into Lucifer.

“You’re next!” she said, and he looked like he was about to die. “Hmm. I think Mr. lobster would be good.”

Hands up in front of him he backed away, only for her to press the tattoo to the underside of his wrist, and he relaxed quickly at the platonic touch.

It was only the eye contact he struggled with now while she held his wrist. ‘This isn’t too bad,’ he thought, even as she wet his arm and held the paper in place under her hand.

“Next?” she asked once his lobster wasn’t going anywhere.

After the first package, she could see him relaxing into her touch instead of jumping or shying away. Excellent progress. She was happy to pack up for the night, but Leviathan requested the second of many packages and she wouldn’t discourage him now.

She was about to reach for the shower head, when Leviathan held her in place against the tile. It was her turn to shy away as he licked the stamp onto her thigh, colouring inside and outside the lines, until he was satisfied it would stay.

She wasn’t allowed to choose any more tattoos after that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't do the description of these temporary tattoos justice. So please make sure to enjoy the images I based them off of: https://images.app.goo.gl/KUdisdK2eiiJhhW27
> 
> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	50. Sleep Now, Please

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC is tuckered out after dealing with Leviathan and needs sleep. So, she goes to where she knows she won't be bothered.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't do the description of these temporary tattoos justice. So please make sure to enjoy the images I based them off of: https://images.app.goo.gl/KUdisdK2eiiJhhW27

Standing in front of Lucifer’s door, she debated the intelligence of her impending request.

Holding her breath, she knocked loudly before any more thought could occur, and when the door swung open curious eyes took in her state of undress and skin covered in cartoon sea creatures.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked, and she could see him trying to school the quirk of his lips.

‘Well that’s a good start: Amusement over pool damage discussion,’ she thought.

“Can I sleep in your room tonight?” she asked flatly.

He coughed into his fist, clearly not expecting either her appearance or her request.

“To sleep,” she made sure to clarify.

“Is there something wrong with your room?” he asked, as if she weren’t standing in front of him in a damp bathing suit and children’s sticker tattoos. All the same, he ushered her in.

“It is full of demons,” she said, undeterred.

“Have you tried asking them to leave?”

She sighed heavily, and looked back towards her room, then back to him. Everything about her said ‘exhausted’. He wondered if she’d slept at all other than through magical inducement.

“I see. I should assume that you want me to deal with them then?”

Her pursed lips, and the shifting of her weight to her toes and back to her heels, was answer enough.

“Very well. I will go remove them.”

“But—”

“But?”

“I think Mammon might have broken my bed,” she whispered unnecessarily.

She really didn’t want to throw him under the bus like this but the last crack he took to it with his head had really done a number. It likely wouldn’t hold her weight. She could only imagine how they’d broken it further and taped it together while she was away.

‘Of course Mammon has broken her bed,’ Lucifer thought, running his hand through his hair. “Very well, you may stay here tonight,” he said. “I will deal with them when they attempt to demand your return as well.”

She had expected push back and a sigh of relief left her more noisily than she had intended.

“I’ll grab you something to wear that is less…wet,” he looked her up and down, “Unless you’re in need of another hair wash?” His smile was mocking but as he lifted her hair to tease her he realized it did indeed smell of pool.

It was hard not to laugh at Lucifer’s free hand covering his face in dismay.

“Bathroom is to the left.” He pointed and she sped out of his sight as quickly as she could.

Pausing to look at herself in the mirror, she had to cover her mouth when the image shocked her. The only thing that startled her more was the soft ‘ _whumph_ ’ of clothing that landed next to the sink.

She swallowed hard, expecting Lucifer to leave, but he just started filling the bath.

“It’s warm enough,” he said as he put out bottles of something next to the rim of the partially sunken tub.

“Oh. Thanks,” she said, standing next to the tub, waiting for him to leave.

“In,” he said, pointing as if she didn’t know where to bathe.

“Right,” she stood in the quickly filling basin, staring at him. “I don’t need a lifeguard for this. Promise.”

He lifted her arm and she flinched. If it were just the bruising he might’ve left her to her own devices, but he’d seen how she swayed on her feet, her eyes closing in sleep without her noticing. ‘She’d drown before she ever finished shampooing,’ he thought. He raised an eyebrow. “Tell me again how you expect to wash your hair like this?”

“I’ve made do with less,” she said with a wry smile.

He rolled his eyes and then his sleeves. “Shut up and sit down.”

There was no point in arguing if she wanted to sleep here tonight, so she sat down and let the heat wash over her. Her fingers were never going to unprune.

Oh, the sweet nothings he said to her: Dunk. Tilt your head back. Stop moving. You’re going to get soap in your eyes.

“Ouch,” she whined for the fifth or sixth time.

“Well, if you didn’t let him put his claws in you the soap wouldn’t sting,” he scolded softly.

For a moment she really did melt. It felt nice that he cared, but she was tired; maybe she was imagining comfort where there was only efficiency.

“Dunk.”

She did as instructed and when she re-emerged he used a small shower hose to rinse the last of the suds away before working the conditioner in. It smelled like him, not that she’d ever admit out loud to smelling him.

He rinsed her hair again and reached for the strap of her top.

“You got your hand slapped for that last time too,” she said, raising her hand in warning as he dragged the strap lower.

“Last time, I hadn’t seen anything yet,” he said. The rumble that came with it made her sleepy and pliant, but she still batted him away, flinching as she used the most injured arm to do so.

Forearms resting on the lip of the tub, he looked her over again. “Can you actually get out of that on your own?”

She lifted her limbs, and shifted experimentally, miming and mapping and out how best to complete the task. “Yes. It can be done.”

A long suffering sigh left him. “You're not giving me much choice here,” he said after viewing her ridiculous antics.

He pulled the plug and the water began to drain. Like the last time, he claimed the final hosing down was only “to get the last of the soap film off,” of her and the tub. He could be as petty as the next demon.

A flick of his fingers bid her to stand up. She expected a towel, but he reached for her swim suit instead, and she looked at him askance.

“I said you weren’t giving me a choice with that poor show of dexterity,” he said, completely unperturbed.

She flinched again as she reached across herself to shoo him away. “Quit that.”

A knowing look met her objection, and she relented, “Okay, but eyes closed.”

If his hands weren’t wet, she was certain he would have facepalmed again.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Okay, eyes up here, then,” she said, pointing her v’d fingers to her own eyes.

He rolled his eyes instead and lifted her from the tub.

Was it terrible that she enjoyed how expressive he was away from his brothers? And how easily he lifted her?

Eyes locked, he placed one hand on her waist while the other reached for the first strap. She felt nothing. A tearing noise could be heard but she didn’t investigate. Did they all have claws? She didn’t see him without gloves often either way.

It was hard not to blink or look away when his eyes burned into her. Her breathing quickened as the tearing noises continued and his hand ghosted over her. Pieces of her bathing suit snapped into themselves and fell to the floor loudly.

“Ooooh. Asmo is going to be upset with you,” she said, the corners of her eyes crinkling in sleepy merriment.

He laughed. It was a different bathroom, but the way it bounced off the walls was the same, and she enjoyed it.

“I think I will survive,” he said, and she let his smile warm away the chill of the air.

A towel was tossed in her direction when he turned to leave and she was both pleased and disappointed he hadn’t peeked.

Dried off, and in oversized pajamas, she shuffled back to the main room. The bed was already turned down and she crawled in without another thought, snuggling in and passing out.

Lucifer turned his D.D.D. to silent after he snapped a picture of her curled up under his sheets and in his clothes. They’d asked where she was. Now they knew. And they knew they weren’t allowed to wake her.

That didn’t stop the pounding on his door, but she barely stirred when he answered it.

Mammon narrowly avoided being strung up by his wings for a century when she made a noise as though she were waking.

Somewhat placated, they left his doorstep and he turned in as well. He watched her, from his side of the bed, while she slept. His correspondence could wait until morning.

Laying there, he wondered how she had managed to ensnare all of his brothers. Certainly, he had enjoyed his time with her, at least as much as she vexed him. That wasn't enough to make a pact.

Is it her weakness that draws them to her? Satan and Leviathan do enjoy small, cute things. But that doesn’t explain Mammon.’

Well, he would be the first to admit that she was reckless; perhaps it was as simple as that.

Asmodeus had made a pact with her for nothing in return, which meant he was getting something in return that Lucifer couldn’t readily perceive. It irked him to no end.

He’d seen the way that Belphegor and Beelzebub guarded her though she was oblivious to it. ‘She’s never been abducted or harmed while under their care,' he thought. 'As attached as Mammon is, the same cannot be said for his record of custody.' That indicated to him that despite their vastly different outlooks, and ease of distractibility, the twins were lost to her, hook, line, and sinker as well.

‘She is sort of cute when she isn’t wasn’t frowning at me.’

He watched as she unconsciously made her way to the middle of the bed over the course of an hour. When she managed to wrap her hand around his pinky finger, she sighed and stopped moving.

He’d refused to move in his own bed, and it seemed that the barest touch was all it took to still her restlessness.

Perhaps his brothers were simply not used to being needed.

The lights dimmed as he began to drift off to the sound of her breathy mumblings.

Just as he was almost asleep, he jerked upright. A bright peel of tintinnabulation had shaken him awake, and the lights came up rapidly as he looked around for the source of the noise.

Belatedly, he realized that he’d shifted forms in his surprise, and he forced his wings back behind him to allow him to return to slumber on his side.

It was a sound he hadn’t heard in what felt like forever. Had he hallucinated it? He was under a great deal of stress lately. It was possible. Perhaps he would talk to Diavolo about scheduling more human holiday breaks. For her sake though, not for his. He didn’t need rest as humans did and it was clear that she needed it.

He dropped the lights again and tried to return to sleep. The small hand that had lost his when he startled found him again in the dark. This time it was only a soft hum he heard, but he was certain now that it originated from her.

It sounded like ‘Thank you,’ wrapped in layers of sleep and fuzzy warmth.

‘Well, so much for sleeping tonight,’ He thought, retreating to his more humanoid form and sprawling on his back. He didn’t let go of her hand this time though.

Maybe this was another reason why his brothers were so enamoured.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	51. Jealousy is Unbecoming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leviathan reacts to seeing MC asleep in Lucifer's bed and acts as only he can.
> 
> Day 45, Tuesday, February 14th

Leviathan was nearly asleep when his D.D.D. started buzzing again. He glared at it, too tired to move but too stimmed out not to turn off the grinding noise.

‘What is so important that they have to be arguing this late at night?’ he groused. It was well past when raid should have ended. There was no reason for most of them to be online, other than Asmodeus.

He opened ‘The Demon Brothers (New)’ chat, curiosity getting the better of him. They couldn’t still have their hagfish in knots about his video, could they? Well, other than Mammon.

He zoomed in on the image Lucifer had shared. ‘So cuuuuute,’ he thought immediately, until he realized their human was completely covered in Lucifer’s pajamas and sheets. Not a single ocean tattoo peeked out!

The jealousy started to well in him again. He brushed his hair over his eyes and let the device drop on to his chest, shielding him from the light and image.

She wasn’t going to deal with him like this again. He wouldn’t let it happen.

Hadn’t she just sealed them all away to reassure him? Risked her life to calm him? She encouraged him to cover her body in his insignia even.

He tipped forward in the tub, certain he would have a nose bleed if he thought any further on how she’d let him apply them to her afterward. The D.D.D. had flipped forward with his sudden movement, blinding him again.

Something would have to change. Satan and Lucifer had come to help him with her before with barely a joke cracked between them. They would likely help him again. He wasn’t stupid; they were both equally ready to coddle her whenever the opportunity arose. If it meant he was less likely to claw out her throat, would they really say no?

Willing his nails to shorten again, he transformed into his casual wear and pulled himself out of the tub.

The clothing covered anything that would give away the googly-eyed cartoons on his own skin. He made a new chat and sent off messages as he stepped out into the hall.

* * *

Asmodeus slouched angrily out of bed when the polite knocking on his door didn’t abate.

“This had better be good!” he said, eye mask askew and face mud cracking.

Leviathan could have sworn he saw lightning in the darkened bedroom.

“It’s important,” he said and pushed inside.

He had no idea how close he’d come to being clubbed to death with a curling iron. It was only another knock at the door that saved him.

“I’m not expecting company,” Asmodeus muttered, his voice both testy and curious.

“Yes, you are,” Leviathan said from the window on the far side of the room, holding his phone up and wiggling it.

Satan smiled and strode past Asmodeus. “Good evening.”

Oh, that smile meant nothing good.

It took Asmodeus more effort than he’d expected to stop Satan from wiping the floor with their older brother, especially in the dark. There was clearly an emotional investment in this fight, but Asmodeus had more equipment than they could hope to surmount, and his skin care regime came before their bickering.

“Now, would one of you explain why you two idiots are in my room when I should be getting my beauty rest?” Asmodeus asked. His words were tightly controlled to sound sweet even as he tugged viciously on the knot which helped secure Satan to the ceiling.

Leviathan cleared his throat; it was nearly the only thing he could move. “I would like to bring to order the first meeting of the Reverse Harem Club.”

“What are the words coming out of your mouth?” Satan asked tiredly, his body sagging from the ceiling. “We don’t speak Otaku.”

“Actually~” Asmodeus interrupted. “For once, I understand our dearest older brother perfectly!”

The delight that radiated off him might’ve given them whiplash had they not already been bound to the ceiling and floor.

“Oh~ SO cute!” he added as he began to untie Leviathan.

“Stop wasting my time!” Satan shouted down at them. “Let me squeeze the life out of him and then we can both go back to sleep.”

“Oh, shush, Satan, the world is going to end!” Asmodeus squealed. “Our little Levi is all grown up.”

One of the bindings snapped above them, sizzling with short green flames.

“Fine. Fine. Fine. You know, at this point Belphegor has been showing more patience than you lately. It’s almost embarrassing,” Asmodeus chided and tugged a rope loose. His satisfied smirk was unseen in the dark and his stomach clenched in laughter as he watched Satan plummet into the mattress face first. He may get to be a beautiful unicorn, but he still lacked wings.

“As I was translating,” Asmodeus continued, “Leviathan has fallen in love in real life? Neh?”

“A-ah well, I d-didn’t say L--”

“You’re already swallowing your own tongue. Don’t bother,” Asmodeus said with a wave of his hand.

“So, the world might end,” came the muffled voice from the bed. “Why did I have to wake up for that?”

“Because~” Asmodeus began.

“Because I need your help,” Leviathan blurted. “... I need your help to convince everyone to share her.”

Satan lifted his head off the bed. He was prepared to glare daggers over the chaos of the day but instead he found himself gawking once more.

“You what?”

“Well, it’s quite obvious,” Asmodeus said, with the flick of a hand, elbow on jutted hip. “It’s clear she doesn’t dislike any of us. And it’s more than obvious that we’ve all taken a liking to her. So the next steps should be to make her ours.”

Satan pinched the bridge of his nose while he sat up. “And you think any of them would go along with that? Or her?”

“I thought so too at first. She looks so innocent it’s hard to believe she's oh so delightfully wicked~”

Neither of them addressed his words. Choosing to look anywhere but at Asmodeus’ self-satisfaction which glowed unbidden in the room.

“Mammon,” was all Satan said as he stood, throwing the covers off the bed for good measure. It was an argument in itself.

“That’s not a no from you,” Leviathan ventured.

“I’m going back to bed,” Satan said with finality, his cheeks heated.

“Oh, he’s quite right. Lack of sleep will damage the skin! Out! Out! We’ll reconvene tomorrow,” Asmodeus commanded, shooing them all out.

He locked the door behind them and sashayed happily back to bed. Eye mask safely back in place, he mused to himself over the irony of the Avatar of Envy and Jealousy wanting to share.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	52. Evasion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's been a long week already. After finally getting some sleep, MC starts her day.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

Embarrassment covered her cheeks. She had woken much earlier than usual to aches and the confusion of unfamiliar walls, but her attempts to look around were quickly thwarted.

She could clearly see where she had tucked herself into bed blearily the night before, but for reasons unknown to her, she was not there and instead tucked against Lucifer as his own, personal, little spoon.

How sleep-drunk had she been?

Her escape attempt was pitiful in retrospect, trying to move as slowly as possible and let his arm just fall as she scooted to the other side of the bed. The band of steel around her had only tightened, snugging her against him rigidly.

“Stop moving,” he muttered into her hair.

‘What was that noise?’

She tried to piece together her senses. Did he just try to avoid drooling in her hair?

‘No, that wasn’t right. His Infernal Perfectness wouldn’t stoop to drooling even in his sleep.’

Not that it mattered at this point; she’d been covered in Leviathan’s saliva only a few hours ago.

But just in case, she slowly tried to shift her head away ever so slightly.

“Sleep,” he growled, readjusting her again.

She listened to his breathing, unmoving. Was he actually ordering her around in his sleep? Honestly, she couldn’t bring herself to be surprised.

There was the noise again, just at the beginning of a smaller grumble. Anatomy class had been light on linguistic physiology, but it sounded like a tiny inhale or snore the longer she listened. She resisted the urge to move or laugh, taking deeper breaths to still her impending giggles. Slowly, she relaxed further into the heat wrapped around her body.

His not-so-perfect Infernalness was less intimidating when she knew he made tiny snores, and she nodded off again quickly.

* * *

It couldn’t actually count as a walk of shame, as the full extent of her evening had only involved lick on tattoos, a rinse, and sleep, but somehow treading the halls barefoot back to her own room while wearing Lucifer’s pajamas evoked a similar sentiment. At least she hadn't received a lecture.

She yawned into her hand wearily and regretted it as different parts of her bruised and strained body protested. Her grand escape consisted of sneaking away when she woke to the sound of him in the shower; thankfully, no bedsheets out the window or laser beams on this mission. At least she wasn’t limping.

‘It’s still early enough to keep sleeping,'' she thought, “even if I have to move the mattress from the wreckage of the bed frame.’

It no longer felt like she had days worth of sleep to catch up on, but her soreness demanded comfort. Warm, fluffy, blanket comfort.

A huddled form outside her door had her straightening her meandering return and re-ordering her lazy thoughts.

Belphegor was sitting upright, asleep next to her door.

‘He hasn’t been out here all night, has he?’ she worried, and sped up to stoop at his level.

‘Had he and Beel had another fight? Or was he just waiting for her to come to bed after placating Leviathan?’

She smoothed her fingers through his hair. It was something he enjoyed on occasion, whether he would admit it or not. And this way she would be able to see him better.

His eyes snapped open, startling her. Expecting to fall a couple of inches to the floor, she let out a pained squeak when he stopped her descent by grabbing her hand and pulling her forward, jerking the muscles of her arm.

The pain was short lived though, the stabbing reduced to a dull ache as she found herself on her knees and clasped to Belphegor’s chest. His bent legs hemmed her in on either side, and his lack of words kept her from moving at all.

“Belphie?” The worry in her voice stood out.

“Why didn’t you call for help?” he asked over her shoulder.

Yesterday. Right. Nearly drowning in Leviathan’s jealousy.

She had the good sense to look guilty, even if he couldn’t see it.

“You know I don’t have the magic to make that happen. If you can’t hear me...” It’s not like she took her D.D.D. swimming with her.

“No, but you didn’t have to lock us out either.”

She heard the bitterness in his words, and for a moment a sliver of fear wormed its way into her heart when he tightened his hold on her.

It was nothing like the first time they had napped together and he moved. It had been so hard not to panic then. Now it was only a little tendril of self preservation, like waiting for a panther to remember you’re its best friend.

“I’m sorry. I thought…I thought having you two there would make him worse.”

“Then command him to stop. Tell him to grovel at your knees and beg forgiveness for his stupidity!” he hissed.

She stayed silent. He shook away her hand that had returned to his hair.

“I'm scared that you’re going to disappear and there’s nothing I can do to keep you with me if you won’t let me,” he said. “You mean more to me than any other person. You are everything I think about, everything I need, everything I want. Please remember that the next time you’re about to throw yourself into danger.”

He had moved her away so she would look at him, his hands barely touching her as if she were made of cracked glass.

His words had been vehement despite their low volume and he searched her face for understanding.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I promise to be more careful.”

“It’s not just about being careful,” he sighed and kissed her cheeks. “It’s about knowing your safety is more important than anyone else’s feelings.”

She looked down, abashed. How easily he could see through her sometimes. Her nod was slight in response.

“I’ll try to work on that,” she said.

“Good.” He cupped her cheek and brushed his thumb along her cheekbone. “Then let’s get you out of this horrendous costume.”

His fingers made quick work of the first few buttons of the high collared shirt before she could catch his hands.

“We’re in the hallway!” she said, aghast.

“Give me time; I’ll undress you in far more interesting places than this--what are these!”

She sat back, falling on her backside, laughing. Ugh. That hurt too.

The material gaped slightly as her shoulders shook and she clutched her stomach, revealing a number of cartoon sea creatures he had not expected to find.

Belphegor tilted his head back into the wall, also laughing. Eventually, he crawled over to her to inspect what he could peek at through her hands.

“Tch. I can’t believe you let him cover up the mark I left on your neck.” He licked his thumb, about to scrub at it, when she lurched away.

“Stay still,” he said.

“Don’t you dare!” her words were breathless, the aversion and playfulness were there in equal measure. “Do you know how hard I worked to get these?”

She laughed then.

“No, but seriously, my throat is really bruised; it just hasn’t bloomed fully yet. No scrubbing.”

“You let Leviathan press an image into your throat when it was already bruised.” His disappointment dripped from the statement.

“To be fair, adrenalin lets you get away with not noticing a good deal of pain.”

“You’re impossible!” he huffed. The exasperation was mostly weariness rather than anger now. But he kept her sprawled on the hall carpet, leaning over her to kiss the blank areas he could see of her skin, and she was too sore to put up much resistance.

“Actually, I think you should show as many of them as you can at breakfast,” he hummed his amusement into her skin. Her muttering his name only seemed to encourage him to the idea further.

“A-um, about the other day,” she started, while she still had some brain power left.

He was pressing his face against the hem of the fabric and nibbling closer to some sensitive, unbruised areas, and she suspected her words might flee her if she didn’t use them soon.

His tongue curled around a nipple and her spine stiffened, only relaxing everything she had tensed when he retreated.

It was infuriating being caught between wanting to talk seriously and wanting to pull him back to his work. One small act was never enough when it came to him, but she was also very sore and very much wanted a conclusion to her accidental voyeurism.

He moved his mouth to her other nipple, breathing hot, damp air through the fabric before catching it and the hardened nub between his teeth.

Shakily, she brought her hands to his shoulders. “Belphegor. We’re in the middle of the hallway, and as much as you are clearly able to make me writhe here on the carpet, I am much too sore to be played with right now.

He sucked through the fabric and she arched into his mouth against her better judgement. Cold air blew across the wet skin he had licked earlier.

“Fiiiiiine,” he said, as though she’d inconvenienced him by asking not to fuck on the hallway carpet.

Gently, he helped her sit back up, guiding her back to the wall. He sat cross legged and brought her ass to the hollow of his legs, enjoying the feeling of her thighs in his hands as he steered her. “What do you want to know?”

“Hmm. Iiiis that a regular occurrence for you two?” she asked.

“Sometimes.”

“I see.”

She felt him nuzzle at her ear. It was hard to tell if he was being hesitant or just trying to be gentle.

“Are you upset?”

“Mmmm.”

“Disgusted?” he asked before she could finish forming her thought.

“I wouldn’t--”

“I tried to only be with you, but Beel realized he could wear me down if we fucked.”  
His words were needy and grit with indignation. “I certainly couldn’t be out wooing you if he wouldn’t let me up or I was exhausted.”

She blushed. “I don’t think I quite--”

“I can tell he wants you as much as I do, but…I want to win,” he admitted shyly into her shoulder, squeezing her a little tighter.

His hands were wrapped around her, under her bust. If she weren’t so sore, she would luxuriate in his possessive hold on her. If she weren’t so sore, she would do many things. It was ridiculous, but in her semi-sleepy state, she imagined his arms were the ribbon around a present he was trying not to open.

“I like you too,” she said, tapping her hand on his forearm. “ But, I--”

“But I should let you into your room to clean up and think,” he finished what he thought she was going to say, while he helped to lift her up.

“Well, ac--”

He kissed her deeply when she turned towards him to get to the door, gently, slowly, his hands soft against her face.

‘How he still manages to make it demanding must just be part of him,’ she thought.

“Just don’t avoid me anymore,” he said, delivering a final closed mouth kiss before opening the door for her.

She nodded with a small smile and walked past him into her room, shutting it quietly behind her and locking it.

“Well, that managed to answer just about nothing,” she whispered to the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	53. Listening Between Words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a conversation with Belphegor that clears up close to nothing, MC is ready to crash in her bed, even if it means dragging the mattress off the broken frame.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_“Well, that managed to answer just about nothing,” she whispered to the room._

The messy tufts of white hair poking out from the slanted end of her bed did make her smile though.

At some point, unruly demons must’ve put weight on the frame and the slats next to the headboard caved in, tilting the mattress up from its new base on the floor. It was quite a sight to see him sleeping on the incline, which must have been at least 15 degrees. Thankfully, it didn’t seem too difficult a challenge to scale, even in her state.

She rebuttoned her shirt and carefully slid between the covers. The tilt felt strange, but not bad.

“Ow,” she groaned quietly when Mammon’s arms instinctually moved to pull her closer.

His eyes blinked and focused blearily as he lifted his head, hair flattened on one side.

“Where have you been?” he nearly shouted while he shifted closer to her instead.

He threw off the blankets without waiting for her answer, running his hands over her, looking for injuries.

‘No shirt’ she noted.

She sat up, enduring his need for immediate, physical reassurance and let him glide his fingertips over her face. He moved to her scalp, but when his hands cupped around her neck she tried to squirm away without completely telling him no.

His expression grew grim. “Quit fussin’, I’m just making sure you’re okay.”

Sliding over her shoulders, he moved on, but when he brushed over the particularly bad bruising on her arm she emitted a sound of disapproval and jerked unintentionally. His testing had become too firm.

“It’ll be fine,” she tried to soothe him.

“You’ve been sayin’ that since you got here and we both know that ain’t the truth. So sit still and let me see where you’re hurt.”

Ah, he was still pretty angry with her. Maybe not angry so much as hurt?

Patience it was, even if she wanted to sleep.

He noticed the way she flinched when he touched her wrist, and he only tested the joints of her other arm. Swallowing hard, he tentatively brought his hands under her arms to sweep down her sides. Only a tightening of her lips and a slow, deep breath in when he covered the top of her hip.

She’d landed hard there when Leviathan had tossed her, she remembered. How had she forgotten that already?

“Satan and Belphegor told me what happened,” he said, looking at his hands. His voice was rough and had lost some of its anger.

Lightly, he continued down her thighs and she had to use his shoulder for balance, unused to the incline of the mattress. Nothing there at least. He squeezed her toes and calves and knee joints on the way back up.

It felt strange, but relaxing? He was still focused though, even as his hands stalled at the inside of her thighs.

She put her hands over his, guiding them carefully and firmly. There was no bruising there and she released the pressure as she rounded his hands back to her hips.

Beautiful was the only way to describe his worry. His cheeks were dark with embarrassment, his hands sometimes shy, but he was completely determined to map out all of her pain.

Roving upwards again, he searched her back, avoiding pressing her chest in to him as he reached around to her spine and the muscles there.

His lips were wet when he leaned away from her again but she tried not to stare. Now was about reassuring him not stealing pleasure from his mouth.

A sigh left him when he’d finished sandwiching her stomach and back between his hands. Nothing there, either.

He didn’t meet her eyes, staring down at the base of the mattress, but he didn’t take his hands away.

She covered them with hers again and dragged them up over her chest.

“Look at me,” she said. She kept his gaze as she slowly slid them over the outer swell of her breasts and up to her clavicle. The path back down was a straight shot. “I’m safe,” she told him.

His fingers tapped where she’d left them on her hips but not enough to hurt.

“Really?” she asked with more than a hint of humour. She was trying her best not to let the sensations from Belphegor bleed into this reassurance, but Mammon wasn’t making it easy.

The look he gave her clearly shouted, ‘It’s your own fault. It’s not like I want to or anything!’ Not that he could keep looking at her like that for long.

“If you muuuust,” she sighed and pressed him back and into the mattress with her least sore arm.

His eyes were wide when she straddled him. She waited, but his hands stayed on the mattress, where they’d shot to when she moved.

Bringing one hand up to her waist, she wondered, ‘Did he remember his hand here last time she’d been astride his hips to test her hypothesis?’

She brought his other hand up to match, watching as he licked his lips again and lowered his eyes. Lifting herself slightly, she slid his palms down to cup her ass until his pinky fingers reached the crease of her thighs.

“If you can’t stand it anymore, you can squeeze,” she told him congenially. There was no teasing in her voice. His breathing had been speeding up and gradually she felt his fingertips flex into her flesh.

His hands were back on her waist in an instant, but he couldn’t hold still and sat up, waiting expectantly for he didn’t know what.

“I think,” she said, “I need to be more careful.”

Doubt clouded his eyes and she hurried to clarify.

“I need to be more careful because if I get hurt too much again then I won’t be able to kiss you properly.”

Her arms were still slack at her sides, but her mouth was soon active on his, and he provided more than enough pressure back after the shock wore off. He retreated from the kiss when one of his hands strayed too near the cuts on the back of her neck and she flinched.

“Damn right, you do!” he said. She’d broken the tension of his worry and he was left with the coals of his resentment.

He tried not to melt under her apologetic expression.

“Why don’t you ever listen to what I tell you? What was the first thing I said to you!” he wanted to shake her, but he knew it would only hurt her more.

He watched relaxation spread over her while she was on him, fixated on the small smile that he was so close to touching again.

“Hmm. I think it was something along the lines of, ‘Who do you think you are, stupid human?’”

He flopped back onto the mattress. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Ooooh. You meant the ‘Wipe that happy look off your face or I’ll eat you’?”

“Noooo,” he groaned, unable to look at her again as she reminded him of how they’d been at first.

Her hips shifted subtly as she spoke.

“Starting at my head and working your way down until…” she paused with a hitch in her voice, and bit her lip in exaggeration. “Those were your exact words, I think?”

His pelvis lifted under her without thought and she grinned.

“I missed you too,” she said before he pulled a pillow over himself to hide his face.

“Mammon,” she scolded, “don’t hide.” She moved to get off of him, but his hands left the pillow without warning to snap down over her thighs. It was difficult to keep how pleased she was by the action from spilling out loud. His pillow was pulled away from him. She hadn’t come to torture him.

“Help me down?” she asked instead. He only hesitated a moment before he sat up to lift her.  
“Between your legs please? Like this morning, under the bed?” she clarified.

“I- Uh...” There was no saliva in his mouth he realized. He wanted to, but...

“Oh, I see,” she said a little disappointed and lifted a hand slowly to tame his bed head instead, mindful of her limitations. “That’s okay, I just wanted to be pressed against more of you if I couldn’t be your big spoon today.”

He rolled his eyes. ‘Who was she kidding. She was never the big spoon. She’d be more like a jetpack on me if she tried.’

“Kiss me more,” he said as he closed his eyes, lost in the sensation of her fingers on his scalp. A tentative kiss pressed against his lips, her fingers never faltering.

“More, please,” he asked, trying not to pull her to him and risk injuring her further.

“I don’t think kisses will help your situation, Mammon,” she said but obliged him anyways. He had said please, after all.

“Your kisses are enough,” he said, his voice needy as he tried not to roll his hips under her. “Just kiss me more and I’ll take care of myself in the bathroom.”

She raised an eyebrow at his forwardness. He was never this honest.

Her hand slid from his hair to his jaw and she kissed him deeply, letting his hands return to gripping her thighs. She made sure he couldn’t catch his breath between the pace of her tongue and his whines.

Hips quivered under her and she decided to help him by rocking against him. He moaned into her mouth.

“You can’t be doing that!” he gasped out.

“Why not, isn’t it helping?” she asked, leaving a kiss just under his ear.

“No. I mean yes, but--” Another kiss on his neck cut off his train of thought.

“Yes, but the heat of my body and my mouth on you might make you cum in your pants?”

“A-ah,” he stuttered out, with a grind of her hips. “Yes,” he whined, almost embarrassed beyond words.

“Then just one more kiss,” she promised huskily in his ear.

She smiled when she realized he didn’t want the final kiss to end and was extending it as much as he could.

“Mammon, I’ll be here when you get back.”

He stared at the ceiling trying to breathe.

“Off you go,” she said, pulling away even as his hands tried to hold her over his body still. “You better be thinking of me in there.”

She was always amazed at how fast he could move. He might actually be able to keep up with Beelzebub’s morning jogs if the way he continued to flee her bed was anything to go by.

There was no sound until the sink turned on and, shortly after, off.

Striding through the bathroom door she could see him glancing at the entrance to the bedroom, considering his escape.

“Come to bed, Mammon,” she said. His face coloured again until even his ears were red. She hadn’t used any command but he returned nonetheless.

He maneuvered her to lie on his chest and between his legs, cozy as before.

“You’re going to have to look at me eventually,” she said though her own eyes were closed and her face turned away.

She didn’t hear a ‘hmph’ but his diaphragm moved like he wanted to make one.

“ **You’re** going to have to follow my words eventually. You’re supposed to run. Every time, not just some of the time...”

A large, slow breath came and left her while she turned over his words thoughtfully. He deserved that much.

“I tried to at first. But it’s pretty much useless to run from Levi while you’re in a rubber tube and floaty wings, surrounded by water.”

“Then why couldn’t Satan and Belphie get to you?” he asked, his growl soft while his arms tensed carefully around her ribs.

“Because if they came in, it would only get worse,” she said. “I’d have been squished or drowned if they all decided to fight.”

His shoulders sagged and he nearly let his hands slip from her back.

“How dare you make sense while I’m mad at you,” he muttered.

She propped herself up on her good wrist to look at him: red faced, angry, placated, beginning to relax.

“I think I’ve been falling in love with you for a long time too,” she said as if she were talking about the weather.

Slowly, she lowered herself back down to the comforting drum of his chest.

“You can’t be saying things like that!” he said again, though this time his voice sounded strangled to her ears.

“Why not?”

“Just stop moving.”

She tilted her head to try and look at him instead.

“I’m not getting out of this bed again just because you can’t stop wiggling.”

Her laughter tickled his skin. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“Go back to sleep with me,” he grumbled.

“As my Mammon wishes,” she said and relaxed fully onto his naked chest.

“I should make you take a shower. You smell like Lucifer’s shampoo,” he continued to grouse as she drifted.

She didn’t comment on why he recognized the scent so readily.

* * *

Returning from a light doze, she shifted carefully to look up. But she quickly turned away again to hide her smile.

He was always adorable in the morning. If his arms weren’t around her, his fists were usually somewhere above his shoulders, his belly exposed and mouth open. It was very tempting to blow a raspberry on his stomach since he’d come to her bed with no shirt.

But she’d seen the worry and frustration that had faded from his eyes into sleep. A softer awakening might be in order.

She smattered his chest with soft, innocent kisses until he came to; it was possible to tell when he woke, as a blush began to creep down his neck towards her.

A small cough tried to draw her attention away from her efforts, but she continued. She’d waited for him to say something, but it was clear he was either too embarrassed or enjoying the attention too much.

“Is something wrong, Mammon?” she asked and slid her tongue over a nipple.

The strangled squawk he made was worth the wait.

She laughed and finally looked up at him. “Good morning.”

“Hey, human! Stop being so cute. It's sickening,” he accused.

“Cute, you say?” She licked a different portion of his chest and felt his legs quiver around her hips. “I guess I’m not trying hard enough then.”

They hadn’t moved from where she’d chosen to sleep and she shimmied a little lower on his torso with the help of her good wrist. Every time she brought a kiss a little lower she’d feel him trying not to gasp. A tremor that would ripple through his abdomen. It really was enjoyable to kiss him, even just as an activity. There were many reasons he was always in magazines, and his taut stomach muscles were definitely one of them.

Her tongue drew a line above his boxers, and a frustrated whine left him before he reached for her and gently brought her back onto his chest. She lifted and fell with the rhythm of his breathing and eventually reached for his cheek, directing his attention to her confusion.

“I never craved attention like this until I tasted yours,” he muttered, frowning at her.

“Well, you’re just going to have to put up with my attention until you decide what you want,” she said. Her words were serious, but she’d ducked and continued leaving more kisses on his collarbone.

“You can’t be doing this,” he said as he looked away, leaving his neck open to her roving mouth.

“Why not?” she asked, without worry. “I’ll stop if you ask me to.”

“Look,” he ground out, “we both know you don’t want someone like me.”

“Then we seem to know different things, my Mammoney~” She let her eyelashes flutter against the line of his jaw when she said it, unable to move any closer on her own.

“Why do you even put up with me?” he sighed

“You’re my absolute favourite pain in the ass,” she said without pause.

He seemed caught between anger and happiness at her backhanded praise. She waited while he decided and she took time to consider Belphegor’s advice.

She realized, while her mouth wandered, that he’d been right: she needed to stop putting the feelings of others ahead of her own, not just ahead of her safety. It was her job to figure out her feelings, not manage theirs.

If she liked Mammon, then she should just say it instead of letting things stagnate or happen around her. She should be moving forward how she wants.

‘In a house of sins, a small amount of selfishness might be healthy. Let them sort themselves out,’ she thought.

“I like you, Mammon,” she said, attempting to roll away from him on to her good arm.

His quick hands on her ass kept her from moving, and he’d become at least as red as Leviathan could go.

He wished feelings had an off switch.

“You’re a real handful sometimes, y’know that?” he asked, rather than answer her second confession to him.

“I know I'm a handful, but that's why you've got two hands,” she said, wiggling ever so slightly to draw more attention to the placement of his hands.

That was probably one of her favourite sounds, the tiny, frustrated groan that just barely made it past his lips. It made her want to do such terrible things to him.

“Why ya gotta be so curious?” he said, when he’d gathered himself. “Wantin’ me ain't gonna do anything for ya.”

“This squishy heart can want anything she wants to,” she countered, referencing the things he’d said when he’d thought she was sleeping.

“Yah, well, only a stupid human like you would want a scummy moron like me. So, as your first demon, I’ll have to do the right thing and advise against it.”

“Well, I can’t unlike you now, Mammon.”

“Why are you so insane? Look at you, you’re smart and funny and gorgeous… for a human. A-and you say you want--” he cleared his throat, willing away his discomfort, “you say you like me. But, I’m just Mammon the scummy, scummiest of the scum.”

“Idiot,” she said warmly, “I like you because of how I feel when I’m near you. That’s more than enough. And I don’t think you’re scummy.” She booped his nose with her finger. “Now quit fussing. If this is all you want, or too much, then we can stay here or dial back. I’m just happy to be with you.”

He was usually the embarassed one, but here she was baring her hidden secrets to him, and hoping he didn’t stomp on them; It was difficult not to build a matching blush of her own.

“You’re a weird one,” he said, gathering her closer in his arms. “ Don’t think that’s a compliment. I’m just sayin’ it’s fun havin’ my way with you.”

Rolling her eyes, she listened to his heart beat under her. ‘What a perfect and delusional non-answer.’

“We okay?” she asked.

“Yeah, we’re good,” he eventually answered.

“Good,” she said, after taking another moment to enjoy the coziness of their inclined embrace, “Because we should head down for breakfast.”

A soft rumble travelled through her as Mammon nuzzled the top of her head, but he was upright next to the bed quickly. She was impressed he’d managed not to jostle her.

The pile of clothing next to her bed was donned equally as quickly. “Meet you down there,” he called as he escaped, still hopping in her doorway as he pulled on a sock.


	54. Change Places

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC convinces herself to go down to breakfast while still completely covered head to toe in Leviathan's temporary tattoos.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable
> 
> Thursday 46th Day - Breakfast

‘Maybe this is a bad idea,” she thought, pausing in the bedroom doorway.

But when was she going to have a chance to provoke so much reaction from so many of them again? When Belphegor was bored, he really did come up with some interesting pranks; She wasn’t about to pie Lucifer in the face, or call Satan by the wrong name all day, but a casual outfit that managed to show off the majority of her temporary tattoos, well, she could manage that. ‘Would he even remember that he’d mentioned it?’ she wondered.

Her entrance to the dining room with a small “Good morning”, gained the usual ripple of movement and replies but it seemed to last longer than normal. Taking her usual seat between Beelzebub and an uncomfortable Mammon, who was looking anywhere but at her, she enjoyed the enormous grin that spread across Asmodeus’ face. Dressing this way was definitely worth the momentary discomfort, and it paid back in dividends based on Leviathan’s expressions.

Maintaining eye contact with Leviathan she watched him cycle through a variety of miens. His back straightened and leaned forward, his eyes gleeful and excited until they suddenly grew wide and he glanced around, his face flushing darkly. Quickly enough, his demeanor changed and she watched a faint angry purple encase him, his expression hardening and his gaze darting enviously to his other breakfast companions.

It was unnerving, but it disappeared faster than she had thought possible. He’d reined it in on his own and she felt proud of him, but her smile sent him into another cycle of arrogance and mortification. Only slivers of jealousy surfaced from then on.

She could feel Beelzebub’s gaze on her as she reached for what passed for a scone here, googly-eyed sea creatures lining the inside and outside of her arm. Without fail, the twins were at odds: Belphegor seemed to be having the time of his life watching the table react, while Beelzebub just scowled down at his plate.

“My goodness, dear,” Asmodeus said, “what lovely markings you have there. If I’d known you were interested in tattoos I would have introduced you to a cosmetic dermatologist I know.”

He was clearly teasing her, but it was the first time they’d really spoken since Monday. They’d traded a few Devilgram photos and messages in the TEAM PARTYYYYY chat with Mammon, but meals had been quiet between the two of them since she’d commanded him last time.

“I wouldn’t think such a physician would be interested in this kind of design,” she said politely as she finished filling her plate and pouring herself water.

“I’m sure we could help you pick out some gooorgeous mating marks~” he answered.

“Some what now?” she asked, about to bite into a croquette before the croquette disappeared from her fork and into Beelzebub’s mouth.

“Beel!” she complained, now ignoring Asmodeus to deal with the demon chewing next to her face and dropping crumbs into her cleavage.

“Sorry,” he said, though he certainly didn’t look it, “the mushroom stuffing is bad for you.”

“Oh,” she said, forgiving him slightly. “Well, just tell me next time and you can have it, okay?”

“Mhmm,” he said, nodding much closer to her than she was expecting. As tucked in as she was, she couldn’t lean any further into her chair back and Beel was practically in her bosom as he reached across her and took away the croquette platter. She tried not to look too flustered as she felt his warm breath on her tattoo littered chest.

“Sorry, what were you saying, Asmo?” she asked once Beelzebub had left her personal space. She’d actually forgotten.

“Mating marks. They’re patterns on the body, usually unnoticeable until their wearer gets horny. Some demons are born with them, but others can be imbued or embellished.”

“Hmm. That’s very interesting,” she said, reaching for something else only for Beelzebub to move it further away too, “although that sounds like it could be highly inconvenient.”

“Not if you’re a demon, darling. We tend to be much more direct.”

“Except when you’re not,” she said, though her voice held no real judgement.

“Well, yes. I suppose we do have a reputation for being,” he paused for effect, “cunning.”

“Hmm. I don’t know, I think the human way is much easier, and less… public. You just send a message to someone you like saying you’re DTF.”

“I’m not sure that is necessarily the best breakfast conversation,” Satan said. He had appeared irritable since she sat down and had since disappeared behind his cup of coffee, sipping loudly.

“We’re not talking preferences, Satan. This is literally a cultural exchange, the point of my visit. It’s no different from saying some demons have horns and some humans have blue eyes.”

He poured himself more coffee from the carafe and immediately brought the cup back to his face, clearly done discussing the matter.

She sighed, “Well, if it’s a sensitive topic, perhaps you’re right.”

Asmodeus chuckled at his brother’s expense. “Sensitive indeed.”

She rolled her eyes.“You’re incorrigible.”

“Althoooouuuuuugh~ You never did answer in the chat what your preference is.”

She tilted her head to the side, playing coy. “Come now, Asmo,” she said, her face gloating momentarily at the reference, “surely you must know what all women want.”

Asmodeus was excellent at making breakfasts uncomfortable for her. It had become clear that all six of her pacts were interested in her physically at the very least, and as different as each of them was from the other, he was practically asking her to name a favourite. Not to mention Lucifer, who had cared for her thoughtfully on two occasions and fucked her thoroughly once.

She sent a wink to him while he was trapped in his thoughtful expression, and it had him back on his metaphorical heels. “Silence is a good answer, too,” she said, attempting once again to fill her plate.

“Beel, should I just move if everything around me is poisonous?” she asked as he took yet another thing off her plate.

“I’m done. You can have my seat,” Leviathan said as he beat a hasty retreat.

She nodded her thanks, not waiting for Beelzebub’s answer, and rose with her empty plate and water to move to the other side of the table. Lucifer said nothing about Leviathan’s departure. It was likely that he’d made a similar assessment when she’d arrived; Leviathan had lasted down here much longer than she’d expected.

Satan, at the end of the table and to her left, slid a few things nearer to her, while Asmodeus ate delicately to her right.

“Asmo, at least take me out first,” she said dryly.

The hand on her knee retreated back to the side of its owner accompanied by a giddy squeal. “I’m so glad you didn’t forget~! I hope you don’t mind if we go out early? I’d like to try and make it to a few clubs tonight.”

She had completely forgotten and bought herself time by stuffing into her mouth something that looked like it had green veins throughout its thick breading. On second thought, she didn’t remember him saying anything about clubbing. It was a Thursday night. There was no way he hadn’t just made that up.

Without looking up, she could feel the death glare Belphegor was sending to Asmodeus. It was as though it passed through him just to chill her.

Mammon’s mood wasn’t much better. While he’d avoided looking at her after his initial shock, now she was directly across from him and he was charting every tattoo with his eyes. Suddenly her low cut top felt too low.

“I haven’t picked out anything to wear yet, though,” she said.

“Don’t worry, I have just the thing,” he promised. “It might be a bit too much for the party, after all. Well, technically too little, but it will be perfect for The Fall!”

Her approving laughter set the table as back at ease as possible.

“How early is early?” she asked.

“Let’s head out after dinner?”

“Mmm. It’s a date.”

Mammon choked on his foxglove pastry and the blue of his eyes pierced her.

Asmo’s delighted exclamations of her cuteness and his unexpected hug broke her from her preoccupation with Mammon’s discontent.

“Actually, Satan,” she turned to him, still captured in Asmodeus’ arms, “would you have time today for a walk? I have a terrible case of cabin fever and could use some time outside.”

He tilted to look at her side of the table and at the small octopus that sat on her thigh, winding its way up to the hem of her skirt. “It’s a bit windy out,” he said without batting an eye. “You’ll need something warmer.”

“Perfect!” she said, digging into some sort of stuffed waffle. Hopefully, that would defuse her slip up.

“As long as you’re back in time for us to primp and prep~” Asmodeus said.

Her hand came up and covered her cheek before he could land his smooch on it. She was getting faster!

“Lips to yourself, Mister.”

“That’s not what you said before,” he purred.

The hand hiding her cheek shot up and grabbed a single, sleek lock and created tension, tugging gently. “I’ve never needed to before,” she said, appearing unperturbed and eating now with her fork in her left hand. “Now stop provoking Mammon, or we’ll have the same discussion as before.”

He opened his mouth to respond, but was interrupted by Lucifer calling his name in warning. She released his hair and offered a look of gratitude. Sometimes it was nice to have backup.

‘It’s strange being on this side of the table,’ she thought, looking back at where she was usually sandwiched between Mammon and Beelzebub. She could see now that the chairs weren’t evenly spaced any longer; they’d inched inward, closer to her seat.

Beelzebub was eating slowly, as if considering each bite, but she watched him covertly through her eyelashes and she realized there was an intense conversation going on between him and Belphegor that she couldn’t comprehend. It was only a subtle shift of shoulder or the twitch of a facial muscle, but when she leaned forward, or if Asmodeus reclined, it became obvious that Belphegor was doing something analogous.

At least their hostility had dropped away. ‘What are they talking about? How specific can they be with only vague feelings?’ she wondered. Her eyes travelled back to her plate and across to Mammon. ‘Now if only _he_ would relax some.’

This wasn’t her circus, but they were her monkeys, and as much as she wanted to indulge his overprotectiveness, she couldn’t anymore. She could reprimand Asmodeus until she was blue in the face, but this was something Mammon had to figure out for himself too. She couldn’t continue trying to manage his feelings for him.

“Oh, right,” she said, as she cleared her plate from the table, “I rescind my command to stay out of the pool room.”

She took her plate to the kitchen and felt six pairs of eyes follow her with various impressions dragging down her skin. If she’d looked back, she’d have known the angriest was Lucifer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a quick reminder for anyone keeping count at home
> 
> Reasons Lucifer has his feather's ruffled:  
> He leaves Wednesday Morning, she's making chocolate.  
> He comes back, she's got a flying cat.  
> He comes home and she's skipping dinner because she almost died while destroying the pool with Leviathan AND endangering Diavolo's exchange program.  
> He goes to bed and she knocks on his door. Has to wash her stupid hair again.  
> He tries to sleep. She speaks in a language he hasn't heard since their fall.  
> He finally falls back asleep, she wiggles around.  
> He expects to lecture her in the morning. She's gone back to her room and sleeps on the broken bed anyways.  
> He is trying to get everyone to have breakfast together and she comes down essentially wearing ownership tattoos all over her which are bound to cause a fuss.  
> Then, she moves to the other side of the table and He has to reign in Asmodeus again.
> 
> 24 hours. She's just chaos to his schedule. It's a miracle he doesn't have ulcers after months of this.


	55. Do You Think She Loved the Monster In Return?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC escapes the house for a walk with Satan
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

A Little Demon slid under the crack of her door with a light blue message card just as she hit send on her reply to Satan’s summons. “Hello, little one,” she said, stooping down. “What have you got there?”

It wasn’t signed, but judging on the colouring of the Little Demon and the card, she assumed it was from Belphegor. Everyone here did seem to appreciate colour coding.

The Little Demon stood patiently next to her broken bed frame, presumably waiting for a response. She attempted to tamp down the surge of heat under her skin; her blushing like a giddy school girl over a note was not something she wanted the Little Demon to report back.

She pulled out a message card of her own; teachers often gave them out as prizes for answering difficult questions in class, and she had quite a collection of them now.

She placed the card in the Little Demon’s hands and reminded him that humans prefer for them to knock and ask entrance, unless they need help. It scurried away and she readjusted her new, warmer attire, following after it to meet Satan.

Hand on the door to meet him on the front stoop, she paused and looked back. From the balcony atop the branched stairways, a pensive Belphegor eyed her up and down. He hadn’t moved to slow her this time, but this time she had considered staying, and judging by his expression, he likely knew it too.

* * *

“Ahhh, It’s so good to be outside again!” she said, stretching her hands above her head and into the breeze.

“Where would you like to walk to?” Satan asked. “Shall we head up to Silent Avenue?”

“We can go wherever you like,” she said, swaying her arms as she walked, “so long as it is outside!”

“To the parks we go, then.” He held out his arm and she only paused for a moment before linking hers under it.

Their chatter was light: the weather, passing information about sports teams, the need for wing washing with regards to Rancor. But his smile chafed at her; It never changed and never faltered.

“I found a word the other day,” she said, stifling her shyness. It was either going to sound stupid or it wasn’t, no point in continuing agonizing about it.

“Eccedentesiast,” she said when she’d waited an appropriate amount of time without question. His eyes almost smiled at that.

“And where would you have found that?” he asked.

“I…I may have borrowed one of your books,” she murmured.

Full stop, in the middle of the path, he hinged her forward on their linked arms to better glare at her.

“You did that, despite knowing how dangerous they are?” His voice was low and dangerous.

“No,” she answered truthfully, “I checked out a book from the library, but I did need some way of unmasking you at least for a little bit.”

He debated how high he could throw her into the air without seriously injuring her. Just a little scare.

“Don’t be too angry?” she asked, pulling his arm tighter to her.

More calmly, and with a bit of humour, he said, “You’ll be the death of me, either by imploding fury or Lucifer when I ‘yeet’ you into the stratosphere next time.” He resumed their walk.

“Can I assume that means you’ll put away the fake smile for me at least some of the time?”

“Something trained from habit to second nature can’t easily be unlearned, but I will make an effort,” he said, patting her hand around his elbow.

He both loved and hated how readily his answer pulled a smile from her. Something so simple shouldn’t bring her so much joy.

“There’s something I wanted to ask you,” he said, transitioning them away from his previous discomfort. “It’s about a human-world book I acquired recently, a collection of old folklore, tales, and legends.”

He tried to be brief in the retelling, without it losing any of its important symbolism.

The analysis she gave him of the beast’s dying moments were not in depth, but given the circumstances and tropes of the time, it was likely full of love according to her logic.

He turned it over in his mind, wondering if that’s what he felt as well. The longer she was near him, the easier it was to control his anger, rather than let it control him. When she’d read in his lap, much of it was replaced by an uncomfortably tight, warm feeling in his chest.

“Do you think she loved the monster in return?” he asked.

“Hmmm. It’s not possible to tell. There are numerous similar tales, but they tend to rely on some form of innate good or in the modern world, the hostage begins to believe in the humanity of their captor. They cease to perceive the captor as a threat when they hold values which they can bond over.”

Her answer did not put him at ease.

“It makes some sense though,” she said. “Every monster once had a soul that was as soft and light as silk. I fear the thing that stole that silk, not the monster.” She cleared her throat and looked away. “Clearly, the humans were the more abhorrent of the two choices.”

“Then when is a monster not a monster?” he asked. They promenaded through a grove of gnarled trees.

They looked ghoulish, illuminated by bobbing glow lanterns. ‘How did they grow with no light?’ she wondered. She was glad for Satan’s company; this was some Snow White in the woods bullshit.

“When you love it,” she finally answered, “at least that is what every story will spoon feed you.”

His counter was faster than she’d expected. He’d obviously already considered the question before. “You can love a monster, it can even love you back, but that doesn't change its nature.”

“Professor,” she scolded, “are you attempting to fashion me into a maiden that needs saving?”

The pink that swept across his cheeks was immediate. Whether it was because of the new form of address, or that she’d called out the underlying meaning to his allegory, she wasn’t sure.

“I am the dragon,” she said, poking him in the chest with her free hand, “and I will eat you whole.”

They laughed together at that, at the absurdity and the small truth behind it. Everything seemed so much more relaxed after that. This was where they stood, and she was content with that.

At least she was.

“So, why haven’t you taken a lover while in the Devildom?” Satan asked without further preamble.

“Satan, you can’t just ask a lady that.”

He raised an eyebrow at her reply.

“Well, you shouldn’t go asking humans that, anyway,” she huffed.

“If I promise not to tell?”

She grumbled at him, but as far as secret keepers went, she was certain he would be just as reliable as Leviathan, if not more. And it wasn’t like she could talk about this kind of thing with Leviathan, not if she wanted to keep his head from exploding.

“Dick is everywhere, but chemistry isn’t,” she said, crudely and with finality. 'Was that rude to say if he'd already offered to "help" her?'

“Both seem to be quite common and near when you’re at the House of Lamentation,”

She rolled her eyes and slumped her shoulders.

“I think you know as well as I do that if I outright said that I like one of you, your house would burn down and your government might collapse.”

“Possibly,” he laughed, but conceded. “However, if you avoid the conflict to keep the peace, you will only start a war inside yourself.”

“There’s much to be said about honest feelings and bad timing making the most painful combination,” she countered. ‘Why cause unnecessary pain?’ was left unsaid.

“And if it becomes necessary to keep the peace?” he pushed her.

“I suppose I don't necessarily need a relationship,” she said mostly to herself. “Theoretically, I only need consistently good sex and good conversation, something to take the edge off of life.”

“Nothing serious and no pressure, then?” he asked.

“I don’t think anything in the Devildom is as simple as that,” she laughed. “But my days are better when you’re a part of them. How’s that?”

“I think you find a new way to surprise me everyday,” he said.

“How very diplomatic of you,” she said, unimpressed. “Of course I do, I’m a little different every day. Besides, I tend to have to adjust depending on who I’m with.”

He didn’t say anything but his expression held questions.

“You think I don’t adjust my mannerisms for everyone I meet? It’s not just with demons.”

She could see him trying to smooth the thoughts out of his frown.

‘It’s unlikely she’d use the same words with me as she does with Mammon when she could dumb it down,’ he concurred, ‘She saves her succinct expressiveness for me.’

“I don’t take Levi on adventures as I do with Mammon, and I don’t enjoy food the same way with them as I do with Beel,” she continued to explain, her free arm gesturing while she struggled for the right words.

He flinched when she mentioned Leviathan. Enough for even her to notice.

“I take it you’re still upset with me,” she ventured. “You haven’t said anything about it, but…”

“Just because I haven't reacted yet doesn't mean that all is forgotten,” he said, stopping and turning to face her. “I'm just waiting for the right moment and that should scare the life out of you.”

She audibly gulped.

“As for chameleonism,” he said, changing the subject, “everyone does that. You’re still you. And we see you.”

She didn’t seem convinced. “Humans shed a thousand skins in a lifetime, Satan. Learning a new me is difficult but not impossible. You have to remember, every seven years a human has finished replacing every cell in their body only to start over again. I am never the same person I was the day before.

“Reminding myself of that is one of the ways I avoid being overwhelmed," she said as she collected her buzzing D.D.D. from her purse.

It was obvious he was thinking on her responses, so she let him lead her blind as she answered her messages.

* * *

**Lustationship Chat (2):**

**AsmoBaby:** Good Morning, Beautiful!

 **MC:** Good Morning, Most Gorgeous One.

 **MC:** I hope your day is as nice as your butt

 **AsmoBaby:** *Heart-Kiss Blowing Demoji*

* * *

She hesitated as Satan steered them down another path, but the gradient evened out and she dropped her hand from his elbow to his hand.

Distracted from his thoughts, Satan looked over at her hand in his. Did she notice he’d worn gloves today? She didn’t seem to notice their change in position at all except to move more readily than when she’d been closer to him. Perhaps she was innately anxious not to stumble or misstep without him near?

* * *

**Foodiling Party of Two Chat (2):**

**Beelzeburger:** Lunch?

 **MC:** At home okay with you?

 **Beelzeburger:** What do you want?

_If she was lucky her face wasn’t giving her lewd thoughts away to Satan while he gave her next words thought. Hopefully, Beelzebub just thought she was taking her time to consider food, not how best to devour him._

**MC:** You know what I like. Surprise me!

 **MC:** *Smiley Demojicon*

* * *

Did she know how angry he was with her after she had misused his magic yesterday? Had she invited him out here to talk about it? She knew him well enough now to know he wouldn't want to have that kind of discussion with his brothers around.

He’d already heard more than enough from Lucifer and Mammon. Levi’s punishment had not been limited to words: Every one of Leviathan’s Ruri-chan figurines were being held hostage by Lucifer until he completed deliverables for Barbatos.

What did he even want to say to her if he couldn’t just shake sense into her? ‘Think of your pantheptera? How would I explain your death to Rancor? Think of me?’

Should he talk to her about the way she’d almost injured Belphegor instead? Maybe he was ridiculous for wearing gloves out of concern and it was something entirely different altering her strength.

* * *

**b357fr13nd5 Chat (2):**

**L3VI:** Ur face triggers me

 **MC:** Could this be

 **MC:** "Affection" 

**MC:** ??

 **L3VI:** SHUT up

* * *

She put her D.D.D. away and slotted her fingers between his gloved ones, oblivious to the texture, all of her focus on him again.

“Hey, hey, hey! None of that!” they heard as branches began to sway in nearby bushes. She should have been alarmed, but she would know that voice anywhere.

“Mammon?” she called out.

“The one and only!” he said as he sauntered out of an unkempt area of the park.

She followed his gaze and looked down to find her hand in Satan’s. When had they changed that? Had she done that or had he?

“What are you doing out here?” she asked, ignoring his demand. “Stalking or eavesdropping?” she teased him, but without any real malice.

“Of course not!” he said, scratching the back of his head, “I mean, it’s not bad to hear your voice… but, I'm bored over here. C'mon human, time to entertain the Great Mammon!”

“We can cook up some devious ideas after I’m finished walking, Mammon,” she offered.

He wasn’t ready to be shaken off so easily though, even with Satan glaring at him over her head.

“We should be going to get you a potion of healing of some sort. And you shouldn’t be getting all flirty,” he gestured at their hands, “with Satan.”

Her shoulders hunched slightly. She couldn’t remember how much of the fight Satan and Belphegor had seen.

“Oh really?” Satan said, ignoring the last part, she was sure, and now both of them were looking at her expectantly.

“I’ve had enough of being sleepy,” she pouted, sliding her free hand into Mammon’s for the moment. “No more potions.”

Mammon cleared his throat and looked up uncomfortably before mentioning, “ Satan makes his own balm to help with bruising; I’m sure he wouldn’t mind sharing just this _once_.” The emphasis he put on ‘once’ made it very clear he didn’t want Satan painting balm on her to be a repeat offense.

“Really? You deal with that often? I didn’t know you weren’t just a theoretician, Satan. Look at you hiding your experimental chemistry!” she said. But the silence had her blinking confusedly before turning back to Mammon. “Wait, you didn’t mean in the science way, did you...”

There was a beat where no one said anything and Mammon’s face only grew redder from the topic and her hand in his. A small cough could be heard at her other side.

“Well, whatever ruffles your truffles, I guess. Not like we haven’t all dabbled from time to time...” she said, trying to smooth over the uncomfortableness around them.

She tried hard not to laugh when Satan turned to stare at her curiously and Mammon practically frothed with protectiveness. “Human, don’t be sayin’ that. He’ll get the wrong idea!”

There was no point in correcting him as he tried to tug her away.

“Mammon, can I meet you at home later?” she asked. “Satan owes me a discussion on the meaning of time. We’re going to discuss the differences between chronos and kairos. but I’d also like to look into how those two concepts alter the experience and types of slavery and the inherent perception of time based on work meaning without leisure, or leisure meaning without work. I-it might take a while.”

“Nah, don’t worry about it,” he said, “I’ve got important things to do. Money to make.”

He was walking away, having flashed her a grin, but hadn’t let go of her hand, pulling her, and Satan, along with him for a few steps.

‘Ah, he’s too cute for his own good,’ she thought.

“Bye, Mammoney,” she said, and he let go of her hand from shock. “I’ll see you at dinner, right?”

The smile he gave her could have lit up half of the Devildom.

“Ya, I’ll see you then, human. Try not to miss me too much!”

There he went. ‘Always trying to look cool,’ she thought, and shook her head. He did look very nice from behind, though.

“So, **Professor** ,” she asked, turning her stare on Satan, “bruise balms? Just how kinky are you under that bow tie?”

He adjusted his tie, fidgeting nervously.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know if you prefer the notes as pictures or simply written. AO3 doesn't give me much wiggle room for fonts so I'd really love to know your preferences <3
> 
> Quotations used in this chapter:
> 
> “You can love a monster, it can even love you back, but that doesn't change its nature.” - Eliza Crewe  
> Inspiration taken from The Truth About Monsters by (Nikita Gill)  
> The truth is this:  
> every monster  
> you have met  
> or will ever meet  
> was once a human being  
> with a soul  
> that was as soft  
> and light  
> as silk
> 
> Someone stole  
> that silk from their soul  
> and turned them  
> into this
> 
> So when you see  
> a monster next  
> always remember  
> do not fear  
> the thing before you  
> fear the thing  
> that created it  
> instead.


	56. Surprise Me!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC gets home for her walk with Satan and some much needed down time with Beel over lunch.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

Talks with Satan were always good: complex good, relieving good, unwinding good, frustrating good. It all depended on the topics, and he’d managed to hit her with all of them today.

She locked her bedroom door and carefully peeled the extra, warm layers off of her morning attire, trying to go easy on her sore limbs. The tattoos would have to be scrubbed off before clubbing tonight, so she might as well wear them proudly for as long as possible, even if that meant slightly more skin showing.

It would be up to her unconscious brain now to sort through all that was discussed; she wanted to concentrate on eating instead of remembering her last “gym session” or what she’d walked in on yesterday, and that would take all her brain power.

‘It’s just lunch. There’s no need to be shy about Beel,’ she reminded herself. ‘Beel is a sweetheart. Beel is a teddy bear. Beel has the tongue of a god…’

She clapped her hands to her cheeks a few times and strode to her door. ‘Get it together.’

“Welcome back,” Beelzebub said, turning to greet her, while tending to multiple pots and pans.

“Thanks,” she said, trying not to stare when he turned back to the hearth. He really was lovely to look at. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

“Grab yourself a plate and a chair. These are the last servings to come off,” he said cheerfully.

A mountain of food came out of the warm oven, followed by a few smaller items from the stove. Her stomach grumbled at the aromas.

“Ah, you’re hungry? That makes two of us, then,” he said

He filled her plate and introduced a small bowl to her side of the kitchen table before settling in to what seemed like an impossible amount of food for anyone.

It was pasta? It **was** pasta! A small serving of normal human pasta.

“Thanks for the meal!” she said, and dug in, appreciating a small taste of home. There was nothing weird or demonic about the flavours. She closed her eyes to savour them.

‘This is stupid,’ she thought. ‘I shouldn’t be having this kind of reaction just to the smell of pasta sauce.’ So why did it make her throat burn in the way that told her she was both happy and sad?

She couldn’t hear Beelzebub eating anymore and she opened her eyes, blinking quickly.

“It can’t be that bad,” he said. “I followed the directions very carefully. Did I miss an ingredient somehow?”

“No, It’s delicious,” she reassured him. “It’s just a bit overwhelming to taste something so much like home.” It was difficult not to be embarrassed when he’d caught her out like that, but he smiled so broadly she was sure he was about to sparkle.

When she’d finished the small bowl, Beelzebub was already more than halfway through his collection of dishes, and she looked over the pieces of battered fish on her plate. At least, that’s what her dissection had led her to believe it was.

“It’s safe to eat,” Beelzebub said across from her, observing her uncertainty. “Leviathan said it was a human-world fish: Goliath Tigerfish.”

‘Of course he would choose an enormous and demonic sounding fish.’ She smiled at that and took a bite. Tasty white fish in batter. Hard to go wrong.

“Be right back,” she said, and made her way into the pantry. She pulled out her step ladder and investigated the jars of vinegar she’d seen on one of the shelves above. ‘Likely one of Satan’s experiments… or maybe Beel’s, if he could wait that long,’ she mused. ‘Maybe I should ask him about walking in on him yesterday...but that might open the door to talking about Leviathan too.’

Her small ladder didn’t wobble, but she felt warm hands around her hips anyways.

“Beel, you didn’t have to stop eating,” she said, trying not to look back at him.

“It tastes better when you’re there,” he said, his voice muffled when he spoke into her lower back.

‘Ugh. It’s like he’s made of sugar. I bet he even has the puppy eyes out right now too!’ she thought, but didn’t dare to confirm it.

She safely pulled down a container of, hopefully, white vinegar, but Beelzebub’s hands never left her until they were out of the pantry, and even then only to take the container from her and pour it into a smaller dispenser.

“You did a great job,” she told him when they sat back down. “I was really surprised!”

“Ah, well, I know some things you like, but if we had that for lunch, I’d be the only one eating,” he said shamelessly before taking another bite from his newest dish.

She tried to look as though she was savouring the new acidic flavour on the fish while she reeled in her shock. Beelzebub was rarely so brazen. It sounded much more like something she’d expect to hear from his twin. Then again, when had he not been blunt? Hesitant, yes, but always blunt.

“How bold of you,” she said as she finished her bite.

He blushed and she knew nothing had truly changed. Maybe he was just a bit eager today for her attention after her mishap with Leviathan.

She finished her plate and took her dishes to the sink to soak, seating herself again to keep him company once she was done. It wouldn’t be much longer; he ate much faster than she did, after all.

Thinking back, Beelzebub hadn’t even looked up when she’d entered their room. For all she knew, he might not even know she’d been and gone. Should she disrupt their nice meal to talk about it? Belphegor seemed on edge about it, though. Maybe later; she didn’t want to ruin the comfortable atmosphere for something he might not even be aware of.

Digging into her skirt pocket, she pulled out a small package of ink cartridges and set them on the table in front of her. She’d meant to give them to him on Monday, but better late than never.

He finished swallowing the last of the particular morsel he was working on before picking up the cartridges he’d asked for, turning them over and inspecting them.

One moment he was looking at the cartridges and the next he was at her side, sitting her on the table and pulling her into a devouring kiss. He had been so fast. It was hard to think when he kissed her; she couldn’t compete with him in that regard. It felt like the end of a marathon without the fatigue, endorphins and shaky tenderness.

Finally, he broke away, his delivery fee paid.

“I may have to collect things for you more often,” she said and watched him blush while returning to his meal. But he ate more slowly and she remained in her new seat atop the table, letting her feet dangle and kick lazily.  
“When I'm with you, being hungry isn't so bad,” he said. “I wonder why…”  
“I’m probably just a good distraction,” she volunteered, but she wondered as well. She’d never seen him distracted from food before, except for when Belphegor felt unwell.  
“Hmm. I’m still hungry, but somehow I feel full when I’m with you,” he tried to explain. “It feels as though I can’t relax but having you next to me still helps.”

She looked at him thoughtfully. It was a rare thing to hear an avatar say they didn’t feel their calling. “Then I’ll have to stop skipping lunch,” she said. Her reassurance seemed to have landed its mark and he finished the last sandwich.

“I--I want to know how to make you feel the same way.”

“The same way?”

“How can I satiate you the way your touch fills me?” he asked with perfect sincerity. How could an avatar of sin look so innocent?

She looked at the remains of the empty table and considered laying him across the expanse, riding him there only to let him smell the leftovers and let the crumbs on his skin work in her favour.

“Come with me,” she said instead, and led him back to her room, locking the door behind them.

He eyed the broken bed but said nothing.

“I’m very conflicted, Beelzebub,” she said, and watched him straighten to his full height when she didn’t shorten his name. “I enjoy being with you and playing with you, but Belphegor--”

“For once, I don’t care what Belphegor wants. I’m going to be selfish” he said, cutting her off. His voice was firm and unwavering. “I only need to know what **you** want.”

She leaned back against the wall and hummed. “If you promise that ice cream is better with sprinkles then you should give me your hands.”

His hands were holding hers in an instant and she wound them around her waist, reaching for him and pulling him down to kiss slowly along his neck. She hadn’t forgotten what he’d said in the gym. He’d thought she wouldn’t understand if he said it in the Infernal language but she’d happily use that information today.

“Don’t think I’ll let you be so sneaky this time,” she said. “You belong under me.”

The shudder that ran through him was visible. It was beautiful the way his breath would catch when she ran her hands down his back and dipped her tongue into the hollow of his collar bone.

“I want you on your knees,” she said. “Kneel.”

Once again, he was faster than she’d expected, his hands sliding rapidly down and encircling her thighs while he nuzzled her stomach.

“I want you under my skirt,” she said, and she slid his hands away from their stations to push up the hem of her skirt instead. His breathing was tense as he met her gaze.

“I want you to pull down my panties and lick my cunt until I cum in your mouth,” she said, and his tongue was on her as soon as the words left her mouth. Her panties might’ve been gone before she even finished speaking.

The way he moved never allowed her to predict the next sensation for long. It was just enough to fall into a short rhythm only to be lost to a new pressure or speed. She tried to focus, and moved his hands from her thighs around to her ass.

“Lift me up,” she whispered to him. “I won’t have you bent in half like that when you please me, and I know you’re strong enough.”

A gasp left her as he lifted her quickly, but his mouth never lost contact. She could feel the beginnings of her orgasm building in the way her toes curled and her hands fell into his hair.

He moaned as he sucked on her clit and she arched into the wall, feet dangling, her toes almost scraping the floor.

When he moved to find a new place to taste, she pulled his mouth off of her. He was difficult to move; she’d needed both hands in his hair to tilt him back and away. So much for him being satiated near her.

“Do you like the way I taste, Beel?”

The look of pained need as she held him away told her everything. “I’m going to need you to speak up, my sweet Beelzebub.”

“Yes,” he said, his voice barely audible as he strained against her grip and tightened his hold on her ass.

“Good,” she said, drawing him a little bit closer to his goal, “Then I expect you to drink every last drop when I cum on your face.”

He frantically bunched her skirt even higher, balancing her from hand to hand to do so, his tongue moving faster than before when she released him.

Those hands were large enough to hold her ass without trouble, so she knew the way he was spreading her was not just for ease of holding her. He was tilting and pulling her for greater access, plundering her inner walls with his strong tongue and she was shaking from it.

One, two, three firm, wet swipes of his tongue across her clit and she came undone over him. She hadn’t meant to cum so quickly.

He lapped at her thighs, catching every bit of her pleasure he could and nibbling her skin for its own sake.

“Kiss me,” she said, when she could control her voice again.

The tang of her juices hit her tongue when she tasted his mouth. She held him tightly as she took everything she could from his kiss, his warmth, his passion, his need. She would take all of it. Every time he kissed her, she only wanted to kiss him more.

They were both breathing heavily and she stroked her hands down his neck, caressing every line of his body she could reach until he was lost in the sensations. It was beautiful to have the giant man bent down to reach her mouth and leaning into her hands.

“You did so well for me, Beel,” she said, pressing a soft kiss to his lips.

“Let me have more?” he asked.

“Hmmm. Maybe I should have ridden you on the kitchen table after all…” she murmured in his ear.

He pressed himself against her, pinning her to the wall with his needy desperation, pleading quietly.

“Your body wasn't made to be loved on occasion,” he complained to her as she found his neck again. “It was made to be loved often. Every night with warm hands. My hands.”

Her teeth grazed his shoulder while her hands traced his rib cage.

“Every day,” he whimpered in her ear, when she let her fingers dent into the muscles of his back.

“...with dedication,” he said, shakily, “in the same way your sun goes to bed every night and rises in love every morning.”

She kissed him, letting the last waves of her orgasm finish washing over and enjoying his wordy pleading.

Pushing him away, she stepped past him to pull him across the room with her. She avoided her bed, and hopped up on her table, pushing aside the majority of her homework. He wouldn’t need to hold her up this way.

“More then,” she said, and he moved without question, his hands sliding along her legs, squeezing and pulling her hips to drag her onto his mouth. She fell back on her elbows, already near overstimulation.

She wanted to run her hands through her hair and over her chest, but if she didn’t keep a hold of the table she might end up upside down with his enthusiasm.

“Mmm. I love how good for me you are, Beel.”

His mouth was on her clit again, and the sensation of his thick finger sliding into her had her bucking against his face. She should praise him more often.

A loud banging shook the door to the hallway. “COULD YOU NOT?” Belphegor shouted through the door. “I’m trying to leave for a meeting and I’d prefer not to accidentally eye fuck Barbatos.”

Beelzebub added a second finger, curling them as he stroked her, sucking harder as she came around his fingers to the sound of Belphegor at her door.

If her bed weren’t broken, Beelzebub would have laid her down before he moved to answer the door. He helped her slide her feet back to the ground and smooth her skirt down instead.

The banging on the door grew louder just as he considered reaching for her again, but he could tell Belphegor was close to kicking in the door.

“Sorry,” he whispered with a kiss to her cheek before he sped to the door .

With the click of the lock, the pounding stopped. Beelzebub opened the door and walked past his twin, wiping his mouth with his hand and licking it clean. “Not sorry,” he said.

The glare he received was scathing, but the gauntlet had been thrown down now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	57. The Gauntlet Collected

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor does not appreciate favourtism, unless it's in his favour.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

She could see the rivalry between the two at the door as they slowed specifically to taunt one another, but she couldn’t yet bring herself to anxiety about it, still feeling too floaty. She glanced down at her arm and noticed the bruising had faded. At least she wouldn’t need to bother Satan about that balm right away.

Her concentration left her arm to see whether the door was shut yet, but instead she caught Belphegor’s eye. Why did she always make eye contact? It was like she wanted trouble.

Stiffly, he stalked over to where she still leaned against the table for support, leaving the door wide open behind him.

He crushed her to his chest until she squeaked in complaint and he allowed her to breathe more easily against him, embarrassingly still very heavily.

“How is it,” he asked, letting small rumbles accompany his words, “that you can’t last two meals without me needing to remind you?”

She’d forgotten how tall he actually was until he took her chin in his hands to force her gaze up to him. ‘Is he as tall as Beel?’ she wondered briefly. It was hard to tell when he was always slouching or draped over some furnishing or other.

His mouth on hers destroyed her line of thought. “You shouldn’t have time to space out like that when you’re in my arms,” he said when he pulled away.

The table took her weight again suddenly, and she was grateful for it. Even without Belphegor’s inspection, her knees were weak.

“How do you find a way to make me want to **vigorously** claim you as mine again so quickly,” he continued, sliding her closer to the edge to meet his trapped erection. Her hands came up to his chest with the abrupt movement, fingertips not high enough to reach his clavicle.

“I should fuck you right here, over the table for everyone to see.”

She swallowed heavily, enjoying how he held her in place with a hand at the curve of her lumbar and the other at the back of her skull. He might make good on his promise, and she might not stop him.

“I should make you so loud with pleasure and pain that your cries bring Lucifer to check on you,” he whispered it like a promise, reaching his thumb to stroke her jaw.

His hand retreated from her spine, pushing her back, using her ass as a fulcrum while her legs moved up and around him.

“See how honest your body is?” he chuckled as he lay his upper body over her. “You should listen to it more carefully.”

Hands slid down her shoulders and jerked the straps of her shirt and bra down, dragging them further until they covered nothing but her midriff. She wanted to at least shrug out of the straps that were now at her elbows, but her hands were still trapped between their bodies, barely covering her breasts from the cool air. She’d much rather have the warmth of his chest against her, and the soft fabric of his shirt.

But he didn’t let her move even as his hands tracked lower, to the curve of her already exposed ass.

“So wet and needy,” he mocked as he stroked the sensitive skin of her ass and thighs.

She tried hard not to rock into the touch, tried so hard not to let her head loll back. But he pushed her skirt the rest of the way up to bunch at her waist as well, and a small noise escaped her.

There was no movement except the indentation of his fingers into her hips.

‘Those fingerprint bruises will likely replace the harsh landing bruise Beelzebub mostly removed,’ she mused.

He tilted her hips, grinding her into him, and her thoughts tumbled away.

“Is that what you want?” he asked. “Do you need reminding already?”

A whine left her as he cleared her arms to her sides, leaving them bent against his biceps as he licked along the curve of her breast.

“Or maybe I should actually leave you wanting for once…” he said, moving to lick the other side.

He took her nipple into his mouth, sucking it and swirling his tongue. A needy cry left her as she shifted under him, looking for more connection anywhere. His hands on her shoulders blocked her from clutching him to her chest and she shook in frustration and sensation.

“Please,” she said, her face hot. How had things changed so drastically in the span of only a minute?

“Please, what?” he asked, releasing her breast with a wet ‘pop’.

She didn’t answer soon enough, still weighing her pride, and he drifted closer to the first breast he’d licked.

“Please, Belphegor,” she sighed, letting the tension go out of her body.

His mouth descended to her chest again anyways and she squealed, tightening her legs around him and clutching at his arms.

The seam of his pants pressed almost painfully against the wet juncture between her thighs. ‘Serves him right,’ she thought, ‘If he’s going to cover me with his entire body, at least his pants will be covered in me after.’

He kissed down her body, releasing her shoulders to further compress her clothing down against her hips and free more flesh for his mouth. The tattoos meant nothing to him; his lips and tongue and teeth were everywhere as the sensations scattered her mind. It was impossible to free her arms from her straps like this.

“I fucked you all through Tuesday night into Wednesday morning,” he said between love bites. “You’ve barely lasted 24 hours.”

Her hands finally freed, she reached for his shoulders when he asked her, “Do you need me in you that badly?”

The question he asked against her belly button shouldn’t have melted her so, but the way he said it as he ran a finger along the seam of her pussy lips had her quaking under him and mute.

“Hmm?” he asked, kissing his way back up to her ear, trailing the finger back and forth and dipping into her at his leisure with however many fingers he pleased.

“Yes,” she whispered, her slick walls trying desperately to clench around his fingers and hold him inside her.

She felt him pulling away and she used all her limbs to hold him tight so that he couldn’t move without lifting her with him.

“Yes, please, Belphegor.”

It was his turn to tense. He set her back down the few centimeters off the table she’d lifted away.

“I like it when you remember,” he purred in her ear, letting the hand on her ribcage travel up to comb softly through her hair. She relaxed again and he sprang away from her grasp immediately.

The cold against her skin was unwelcome. Her thoughts and vision: still hazy as her brain didn’t want to take in anything except sensation.

She saw the door, still wide open to the hall, which was open over the railing to the floor below, and tried to consider her options. He was watching her as her eyes landed on the door and then her glare on him.

Shimmying out of her clothes, she tossed them behind the table, frustrated. She moved to step down onto the floor, but he stepped forward and lifted the leg back up by the knee.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked.

“To get you,” she said, unable to look away. Completely bare to him and the door beyond.

His mouth was on hers and his free hand back at the base of her skull, forcing her head back so he could taste every corner of her mouth. “I’ll allow it this time,” he said when he let her breathe.

The world spun and he had her chest flat against the table, the tips of her toes barely touching the floor.

A hand stroked the length of her spine and she arched and shivered. She heard the teeth of his zipper unlocking from one another.

“That’s right,” he said, laying his frame over her back, “surrender to me.”

She felt him wetting his cock along her folds and could only imagine what a mess she was. Beelzebub had already left her trickling arousal.

“Surrender to my touch,” he growled, as he slid into her and withdrew, “to my voice.”

She cried out needily and her fingertips reached for the far edge of the table. Anything to stabilize her.

“You’re my dirty little slut, aren’t you?” he asked, and she moaned for him. “Say it.”

“I-I’m, ah...” she broke off as he continued thrusting into her, rocking the table with his hands cushioning between her and the edge.

“Say it.”

“I’m your dirty little slut,” she choked out the words, panting. “Please don’t stop.”

She felt his laughter through her back as his hands left their buffering grip on her pelvis. “You’re so honest.”

A hand over her mouth and the other at the juncture of her neck and shoulder, he pulled her backward onto each of his thrusts, increasing the pressure and speed. His body covered hers and she was so close to breaking apart under him.

But he stopped and straightened, pulling her upright with him. His hand didn’t leave her mouth but the other wrapped under her bust, trapping her arms again. She couldn’t understand! ‘Why had he stopped?’

Attempts to wiggle did nothing to move him as she continued to spasm around his cock.

“Hey, Human! Oh, it's you.” She heard Mammon’s voice from her doorway. “Whatcha doin’ over there Belph?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	58. Be Good for Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The ending to yesterday's chapter.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_She felt his laughter through her back as his hands left their buffering grip on her pelvis. “You’re so honest.”_

_A hand over her mouth and the other at the juncture of her neck and shoulder, he pulled her back on to each of his thrusts, increasing the pressure and speed. His body covered hers and she was so close to breaking apart under him._

_But he stopped and straightened, pulling her upright with him. His hand didn’t leave her mouth but the other wrapped under her bust, trapping her arms again. She couldn’t understand! ‘Why had he stopped?’_

_Attempts to wiggle did nothing to move him as she continued to spasm around his cock._

_“Hey, Human! Oh, it's you.” She heard Mammon’s voice from her doorway. “Whatcha doin’ over there Belph?”_

She came, clenching around Belphegor’s cock, her feet shaking in their place atop his boots, his shawl jacket and hand over her mouth hiding her existence from the world.

“Maah, just looking at all of the unfinished homework that I won’t be able to copy off of,” Belphegor complained, his words dripping with boredom and inconvenience.

He bent her over with him and removed the hand from her mouth to retrieve a blank answer sheet.

“So far all empty. But if you’re looking for your mistress, I thought I overheard her saying in the kitchen that she was going to visit Levi.”

Breathing silently without his hand was no easy task. She closed her eyes and turned her head to rest her cheek against Belphegor’s chest.

Mammon’s denials of who was whose master were quick to fill the room and she could hear him walking closer.

“Such a hassle,” Belphegor griped, waving him off over his shoulder with the paper. “I don’t actually care, but you might if Levi wants to put more marks on her.”

A strangled, “Aughh” was heard by the door and then swift footsteps faded away.

“You were so quiet for me,” he said, dropping the paper to the floor and running his hand down her neck and shoulder. She couldn’t help but tense around him again, her clit still sending out little jolts into her limbs.

“Let’s see if you can keep being good for me,” he said, letting go of her and dropping her off his feet. He kicked her legs apart and pressed her quickly back down onto the table. He slowly withdrew from her but stopped from pulling out completely when she gasped loudly.

“Ah-ah, keep quiet,” he admonished, and he waited until she nodded her understanding before he pounded into her from behind.

She was sure the lewd squelching sounds were echoing out into the hall and the main hall below. It only made her rock back against him harder. He wouldn’t let them be caught. She hoped she could trust in that. Fuck, it didn’t matter any more.

“Shit,” he cursed into her shoulder blade as he collapsed momentarily to rest his forehead against her back. “I didn’t think you could get any tighter after I hid you, but you’re proving me wrong again.”

His elbows on either side of her, he hooked his hands under her shoulders and shifted his angle of penetration.

How was she supposed to be quiet when he hit that spot inside her? Her fingers dug into the edge of the table, willing herself silent even as she teetered on the precipice of orgasm again.

“I feel so much that sometimes it's hard for me to feel anything at all,” he gasped and panted against her skin. She was shaking under him again, soaking in his secrets as another layer of intimacy.

“But when I’m with you it all seems to balance out,” he said, his words coming out staccato, punctuated by his rough thrusts. “And. I. Love. The way it...Feels. With you. Right now.”

She felt his ejaculate running down her thighs as he emptied himself inside her, and she finally let herself breathe noisily, fingertips still gripping the far edge of the table.

Only his forearms held him away from squishing her further, and she flexed her walls around him again just to feel his hot breath hitch and falter at her shoulder.

“You’re going to be the end of me,” he laughed before easing them both upright and sliding from her.

She turned lethargically, as he swept his hand along his softening cock, removing most of the slickness from himself. His hand reached for her face and she grabbed it instead, sucking the worst of their combination away lest he smear it across her mouth instead. Knowing him, he would.

Safely tucked away now, he withdrew his hand, pulling her to him and dipping to let her wrap her arms around his neck.

Gentle kisses coaxed her away from the afterglow eventually so that he could look at her.

“Now,” he said, cupping her face and brushing his thumbs along her cheekbones, “please try to keep to your hands to yourself today? At least until I get home?”

Her lips parted, and her tongue darted out to wet her lower lip. How could she tell him no when he looked at her like that and held her like spun glass.

It was difficult to look at him at all, knowing he’d made her beg, but she met his gaze, biting her lip to keep her focus. She nodded okay.

“That’s my good girl,” he said, kissing her lips and then quickly again on her forehead, “Now, try not to make Beel so jealous anymore or we’ll wear you out when you try to avoid favoritism.”

“You can hardly blame me for your idea to wear that tattoos to breakfast,” she pouted. It was hard to hold any sort of grudge when this is how she felt after one of his ideas.

“Hmm. Maybe not. I do have good ideas from time to time,” he said, his smile doing things to her insides. He left her with a small kiss, his tongue running along the seam of her mouth before he walked away. “I need to go get changed before I’m late.”

The door closed behind him and she sat down, naked on the floor, uncertain if he’d gotten her off twice or just prolonged the first one for what felt like forever. More importantly, she needed to get up before Mammon came back. She needed to create some thinking space again and this time there was no bed to roll under.

* * *

**‘The Demon Brothers (New)’ Chat (7)**

**Belphie:** Beel will be accompanying me to Barbatos’ strategy meeting today.

 **Beelzeburger:** I am?

 **Belphie:** Yes, you are.

 **Beelzeburger:** Right, I definitely am.

 **Belphie:** Mammon, we’ll meet you there. Try not to be too late.

 **Mammoney:** Aaah, I'm tired of this. Why can’t the castle just send us the cliff notes

 **Beelzeburger** : …

Lucifer is typing...

 **Mammoney:** Fine! Fine. You can’t start the meeting without The Great Mammon, I get it.

 **Mammoney:** *Roger! Demoji*

Lucifer stops typing

 **Mammoney:** But we have to be back in time for dinner.

 **AsmoBaby:** ???

 **Mammoney:** None of your business, Asmo!

 **Not Today, Satan:** *Laughing Demoji*

 **L3VI:** *Side Eyes Demoji*


	59. Buck the Odds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3)**

AsmoBaby has added Not Today, Satan  
AsmoBaby has added L3VI

 **Not Today, Satan:** I am never going to use this chat.

 **Not Today, Satan:** There will be no record of my involvement in this.

 **AsmoBaby:** Fine, well WE are meeting in the common room after dinner if you need to find us for any reason…❤️ We’ll keep it short though, The Fall is calling after all.

 **L3VI:** Today’s agenda: Targeting Mammon

 **L3VI:** We need to strike decisively.

 **AsmoBaby:** Mhmm, very true! If we don’t collect him he’ll just 🌈fuck up🌈 our plans.

 **Not Today, Satan:** WHY ARE YOU STILL WRITING IN HERE?!

 **L3VI:** Why are you still in here reading it?

Satan is typing. Three dots reappear and disappear regularly.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Someone has to make sure you two idiots don’t get into trouble. It’ll only get worse once you add Mammon.

 **AsmoBaby:** *Eyeroll Demoji*

* * *

She’d definitely relied on luck before. It was a little itch in the pit of her stomach that said, ‘Do it anyway!’, and it always seemed to happen at the worst possible times.

It was easy enough to think back to the numerous times she’d felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise or her stomach churn without reason while here in Devildom. It had become so much more frequent since falling into this world. She remembered when Lucifer had been about to smite Luke and all she wanted to do was cower behind Mammon but noooo. That couldn’t happen. Accidentally thinking about shielding Luke and Beelzebub made her stomach twitch like a cramp. A fork in the path. To be brave or not?

Even yesterday or today: deciding to seal the pool room door, not pulling away from Belphegor.

A terrible idea had occurred to her and now the churning in her stomach demanded it be fulfilled.

She picked herself up off the floor and pulled on the nearest covering, not bothering to clean herself up or her strewn clothing.

Well, she was still alive. The gut instinct hadn’t led her too far astray yet, even if it had led her out of her room and down the hall today.

Thin robe around her and barefoot, she ignored all sense and knocked on the door. Why did she do this to herself? Why couldn’t her belly-compass just tell her to drink more water and take a shower?

She knocked louder, more urgently. The door opened under her next strike and she stumbled forward, Asmodeus looking at her both pleased and mystified. She closed the door quietly behind her, and turned the lock, stepped away from the door and nearly into his welcoming arms.

“Sanctuary,” she said, just as his hands were about to destroy another robe of hers.

The dumbfounded look on his face, nothing could have prepared him for her demand. His hands dropped limply at his sides just as the door banged behind her. She jumped, bringing the edges of her robe only a hair's breadth from his body.

“Hide me?” she whispered, her doe eyes anxiously waiting for him to do something, anything.

“Oi, Asmo! I know you have the human in there. I only need to borrow her for a couple hours!”

Asmodeus encompassed her waist in one arm to draw her away from his chest and take in her ravished appearance: hair a mess, flushed chest peeking out from her robe, smudged mascara, and swollen lips. She was still breathing more heavily than necessary and his eyes narrowed at the door; if looks could kill, the door would already have been on fire.

“Come on, Asmo. You just posted a picture of you lotionin’ your legs. I know you’re in there.”

She shook her head, curling back into him, and whispered against his neck, “It’s not like that.”

It was possible to feel him uncoil with those four words, but the opposite happened to her. Her stomach dropped as he quickly lifted her under the armpits and placed her next to the door hinge. He swung the door open and she scrunched her toes back to avoid letting them slip under it.

“Look, you moron, she’s not here. Now leave me to my preparations! Tonight is a big night and I have two to dress.”

“Yeah right Asmo, like I’d believe that.”

She saw Mammon’s hair just over Asmodeus' head. Still blocked from sight, she silently thanked all of the deities out there that Mammon wasn’t any taller. She just didn’t have the energy for that conversation right now.

“Take a good look around,” Asmodeus sarcastically invited, and Mammon did. His steps clipped around the room. She could hear him peeking into the bathroom.

“Have you tried calling her?” Asmodeus asked.

Mammon didn’t answer him.

“Perhaps you should try using your D.D.D. like a normal demon before barging into other people’s rooms~” he said, his words still musical, but the irritation was obvious.

He scoffed in reply. “Whatever, I’ll find her without your help.”

“You can always bring her over early and we can share~” Asmodeus called after Mammon’s retreat to the hallway.

Ooh, she wanted to kick him in the calves! She was still smooshed between the door and the wall; that’s all that kept him safe from a swift kick.

The door closed and she felt the hem of her robe rising on one side. Asmodeus was inches from her, walking his fingers up her leg and exposing her naked thigh.

Her expression shouted ‘sorry’ and ‘I don’t know’ as she turned her palms upward and shrugged her shoulders. The side of her robe fell off her shoulder with the movement, held up only by the catch of the fabric on her breast.

Asmodeus threw his hands in the air and dropped them only to stare silently at the ceiling for a time. What terrible karma had he accrued to deserve this? He tugged her robe back into place before scooping her up.

This was one of the many things that bothered her: it seemed as though unless she was alone, there was no standing, sitting, or walking on her own these days. It was getting ridiculous.

Woomph!

A small smile tugged at her lips, remembering the last time she’d been on his bed. But, he dropped her unceremoniously onto the cushy surface. She’d gone from carried like a princess to tossed like a sack of potatoes.

Soon enough, he joined her, both of them staring at the ceiling.

“Why, in all the realms,” he started, his voice flat, “did you come to my room wearing nothing but sex and a small robe?”

She sighed and rolled to face him. “One, because you destroyed my larger robe, and two, can’t I just cuddle and hide in your neck?”

“Not today, dearest,” he said firmly, though the struggle on his face and the way his hand stroked hers told her otherwise. She scooted closer but the hand furthest from her came across his chest to poke her in the forehead, halting her advance.

“You realize you demanded entrance to the den of lust to claim sanctuary, presumably from lust?” he asked. “I don’t know what could possibly make less sense.”

The pressure of his finger points on her forehead disappeared so that he could use that hand to pull the pillow out from under his head and suffocate himself.

‘Such a drama king,’ she thought. ‘...Or was he? Why did she jump from the cooling frying pan directly into the flames?’

She pulled the pillow from its smothering position, jerking it out from his grasp. Her hand moved to rest gently on his shoulder. “Am I not safe with you, Asmodeus?” She had thought she knew the answer, but his theatrics made her want to hear it from him.

“From me?” he asked, sitting up, “always.”

Shrugging off her hand, he rolled over her without grace until he was looking up at the ceiling with his head resting on her diaphragm and body between her legs. She was surprised he hadn’t shouted “steamroller!” like a child with how he had traversed to his new position.

“From yourself, when you’re with me, though,” he said with his eyes closed, “that is a different matter altogether.”

She felt barely-there strokes at the back of her knee and the feather light touches through her robe along the curve of her opposite hip. “What if I tell you I’m too tired?” she asked, keeping her breathing as even as possible; his head was moving with her diaphragm.

“It depends on if you mean it,” he said, sounding almost disinterested, even as he used his heel to press her leg back up the bed, and slot her ankle into his waiting hand. “Can you rein in your concupiscence? I can feel it rolling off you.”

“What else can you tell?” she asked, curious even if she still felt like a live wire.

He rolled more carefully this time as he turned to look at her, not leaving his place between her legs.

“I can tell you that a human has run into my room, pleading for sanctuary while looking every inch the well loved tart I know she can be.” His grin was wide and she threw her arm over her eyes, uncomfortable under the scrutiny and praise. The sensation of his magic flaring around him was warm, hot everywhere he touched her body.

“So, why don’t you tell Asmo everything?” he said, crawling the rest of the way up her body and pulling her hand away from her face and above her head.

He leaned in, slowly inching towards her lips. The chaste kiss she left on his cheek stunned him. It was obvious that he was stoking the coals of her desire back to flames; when she’d turned her face he was tantalized, expecting to be gifted her neck, but instead he sat back on his heels.

She patted the space where he had originally lain and he sulked back to his new side of the bed.

“Let me guess then,” he said, drawing a finger along her neck. “Judging by your faded bruises, I’d have to say Beel.”

Her heavy blush confirmed it for him and his lecherous grin returned.

“But! I can’t see you fleeing Beel, no matter how voracious he might be. Which means there’s something else.”

‘Ooooh! She’s looking away! How scandalous!’ he thought, and pressed the advantage.

“Beelzebub has never shared so much as a slice of cake with anyone other than you...and Belphegor,” his eyebrows and shoulders wiggled in unison, waiting to see what colour of red she’d turn next.

Oh dear. He’d sunk her battleship. She’d rolled over on to her stomach and hid her head under the pillow, legs bending to kick at the knees.

“My dearest, jezebel~” he squealed. “That’s three out of seven!”

She held up one hand above the pillow clutched to the back of her head. Four fingers brandished in his face.

“No!” he said in utter shock. “Who?”

The pillow came down on his head.

“You’re lucky I haven’t done my hair yet,” he growled playfully as he swatted her rear.

She wasn’t shocked, but she did sit up to properly smother her uppity demon. It ended in a tie, not that Asmodeus had really tried. He gave in when she placed tiny kisses on his cheekbones, pink following everywhere she kissed.

“You should be careful with Belphegor,” he warned from the comfort of her bosom, her hands stroking through his equally messy hair. “He can be sneaky and warp dreams.”

The unlady like snort above him had him raising an eyebrow, not that she could see it.  
“I know when he’s there. I’ve booted him out before, but he usually only peeks anyways. Although sometimes I let him stay and enjoy the sunshine.”

His lips had pressed to the skin along her sternum, ready to deliver a kiss but parted in surprise instead. “You what?” he mumbled. It tickled and she just laughed, “Don’t worry about it, it feels the same as when you try to charm me.”

He hmmm’d and she pushed him away, too ticklish to keep him close again longer.

“Come back here~” he said, reaching for her again, “there was barely any motor to that boat.”

She shrieked and fled the bed, robe parting dangerously. It was a foregone conclusion that he would catch her, but it was still fun.

“Quit it! You’re such a child!” she laughed, barely able to breathe as he attempted to press his face back into her chest.

He licked from her cleavage up to her ear, mindful of the yellow bruise, a direct counterargument to her claim. She met him with only quick smooch and a raised eyebrow, but he could feel the lust in her, coiled and ready to bite.

“Why don’t you show me a different type of good night tonight?” she asked, all smiles for him.

He staggered back dramatically as if mortally wounded.

“You’re lucky I like you,” he said, hands clutched over his heart.

“Very lucky,” she agreed, placing a hand over his.

The moment was short lived as she ended up over his shoulder. “Asmo!” she shouted.

“Bath time~” he sang happily, hiding the pink of his cheeks from her.

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3)**

**AsmoBaby:** Breaking News!!!

 **AsmoBaby:** Our darling human is over for a gossip session

 **AsmoBaby:** And she has a BODY COUNT!

 **L3VI:** Eeeh? I mean, I wouldn’t brag about that. Her first person shooter work is average at best.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Levi, it's a reference to sexual partners.

 **L3VI:** Eeeeeeeh????

 **Not Today, Satan:** Well, based on her accidental magic overload and conversion issue, we already knew Asmo was in the count.

 **L3VI:** Accidental WHAT? WHEN?

 **L3VI:** *Shocked Demoji*

 **Not Today, Satan:** …

 **Not Today, Satan:** A lot has happened. I have a notebook for you to read.

 **AsmoBaby:** That still leaves 3.

 **AsmoBaby:** 😈😈😈

 **Not Today, Satan:** Based on Asmo’s Demoji usage, it’s safe to assume Solomon and the angels are out of the running, but that still leaves the rest of the student body.

 **AsmoBaby:** Nope!

 **AsmoBaby:** She came to visit, deliciously dishevelled.

 **L3VI:** *Side Eyes Demoji*

 **L3VI:** Gimme a minute. Need to go re-read the club mantra.

 **Not Today, Satan:** There’s a mantra?

 **AsmoBaby:** Which means at least #2 lives in the House of Lamentation.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Asmo, Leviathan will flood the entire house. Just report in.

 **AsmoBaby:** Killjoy.

 **AsmoBaby:** I don’t have much time until she’s out of the bath anyways.

 **AsmoBaby:** Beel and Belphie seem to have something regular with her.

 **Not Today, Satan:** And the fourth?

 **AsmoBaby:** Unknown, BUT one of us.

 **L3VI:** We definitely need to get to Mammon before he blows his top.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Actually, that really only leaves GarbageForBrains and Lucifer as number four.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Unless there’s something you’re not telling us, Levi?

 **L3VI:** The odds of that having happened are astronomical.

 **Not Today, Satan:** That’s not a no.

 **L3VI:** shut up

 **L3VI:** no

 **Not Today, Satan:** There’s no way it could be Lucifer. He’s almost never home and he looks at her as though she’s something stuck to his shoe.

 **AsmoBaby:** Then it must be Mammon

 **AsmoBaby:** *Shocked Demoji*

 **L3VI:** Epsilon Nought! That’s impossible.

 **Not Today, Satan:** I have to agree. Mammon almost melted into a puddle of goo when she held his hand this morning. He couldn’t be more obvious with his unrequited puppy love.

 **AsmoBaby:** Then doesn’t that mean it has to be Lucifer?

 **Not Today, Satan:** That still doesn’t seem right. Are we missing something?

 **AsmoBaby:** If it can’t be Lucifer and it can’t be Mammon, that only leaves the two of you.

 **L3VI:** *Side Eye Demoji*

 **Not Today, Satan:** DO NOT LEAVE TO REPEAT THE MANTRA

 **AsmoBaby:** Oooh where is the trust!? So, really it could be Scumbag, either of you, or Lucifer.

 **AsmoBaby:** I do love a good romance mystery!

Not Today, Satan is typing

**Service Unavailable. Please check your connection or contact your system administrator.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh dear, Satan seems to have thrown a fit in the server room.
> 
> Once again, a huge thank you to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter.  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	60. Girl Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Asmodeus and MC get a tiny heart to heart while primping and prepping to go to The Fall.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

“Thanks for talking with me, Asmo,” she said as she leaned forward to let him scrub away the tattoos she couldn’t reach. “I feel like you’re the only person I can talk to about these things.”

“Oh, I’m sure the others would want to hear about your love life~”

She could hear the smirk in his voice.

“I mean it. It’s not just that I know you won’t rampage through the house, but I know I can trust you,” she said, peeking over her shoulder.

“Well, I’m always happy for girl-talk,” he said, ignoring the guilty pang over having already shared her gossip, “especially if it means you won’t implode.”

“Hey,” she said, chuckling her complaint, “I’m not that much of a hazard am I?”

“I see you talking and laughing all day, making sure everyone else is smiling,” he said, wiping away the remains of a jellyfish on her mid-back, “ but I would bet every Grimm to my name that if you had the privacy you’d be crying yourself to sleep still.”

Her body shifted under the oily face cloth in his hands, but he wasn’t able to determine what it meant. Had he miscalculated?

“I--I didn’t realize I was so transparent,” she said finally.

‘Ah, vulnerability,’ he thought. Not a colour he’d seen on her yet. Even when he’d captured her after she accidentally cursed him, she’d never been vulnerable. Frustrated, demanding, placating, yes, but vulnerable? No, this was new. She’d shown a hint of it earlier when she’d admitted to putting notches in her bedpost here, but this was a new level.

“Yes and no,” he said, seriously, returning to his mission of destroying each of Leviathan’s tattoos. “No one, demon or otherwise, can give as much as you do without falling from time to time. Your weekend was proof of that, wouldn’t you say?”

“I like when you use your cute voice,” she said, “but I like when you use this one too.”

“Are you trying to change the subject?”

“No, the subjects just felt the same.”

“Spill your guts, dear one. I can only withstand one type of temptation at a time.”

“That’s not true,” she said, covering her chest with a towel to turn and better look at him. “I don’t think you’re the avatar of lust only.”

His expression told her he was about to check her for a head injury.

“Thousands of years, humans, demons, and celestials alike can’t all be wrong.”

“The Law of Probability says they can. And I think you’re closer to a god of pleasure. At the very least you’re not just guilty of one sin.”

The sound of delight peeled loudly through the bathroom as his oily hands went to her sides and he toppled her over backwards. “Aren’t you just a little treasure,” he purred, rubbing his nose against hers.

“See?” she said triumphantly. Her smile matched his as she waited for him to catch on. “Your lust and curiosity are muted, aren’t they?” She paused, but he said nothing, seemingly lost in thought.

Still between him and the cold floor, she asked, “Do you still feel good?”

The fluffy towel barely covered anything between them and he eyed her warily for the first time. It was one thing to be able to withstand his magic, but it was another thing to reach into his chest so easily and continually pluck at his heart.

His cheek nuzzled into her hand as she reached for him, and he nodded his agreement. He did still feel good.

But she shied away again as he attempted to kiss her, rubbing her cheek against his instead. “Maybe your default isn’t always necessary? Anyone can change over a thousand years, right?”

‘Maybe over a year,’ he thought before stealing a kiss. He didn’t pour any lust into it, just let the soft moment stretch out until her fingers tickled at his ribs and he had to move away.

‘Maybe with practice,” he said standing up, “but that doesn’t get you out of telling me all the juicy details.”

She pretended to swoon on his bathroom floor, incapable of telling him any further secrets.

His simpering eventually broke her feint and she relented.

“Fiiiiine,” she said as he pulled her to her feet and threw additional towels at her. And then still more towels upon towels. “Ah! Asmo! Stop!”

“No, you’re going to get oil on everything.”

“You’re one to talk,” she said, barely breathing through her laughter and the white towels.

“Exactly!” he said after looking down at himself. “That just proves my point. Everywhere!”

When His Huffiness left the bathroom, she followed after, the fluffy ghost of Asmodeus’ bathroom, back to the main chamber.

* * *

“You’re going to have to promise more regular spa days with me if you want me to stop asking.”

He could see the way her jaw tightened; it didn’t grind, she was hiding a smile.

“You have yourself a deal,” she said, clearly winning and fine with it. “Any suggestions, oh Aphrodite?”

“Fuck all of them.”

Why did she even try to keep a straight face when he was around? This is where she laughed at all the things she couldn’t with Mammon.

“True to form, I see.” She did a little twirl and looked askance at the length of the little black dress he’d picked for her. “Asmo, don’t you think this might be a tad…”

“Short?” he asked. “Not at all~ Watch!”

He pulled her into a formal dancing frame, dropping his hand at her waist to draw her knee up to his hip and drag her slowly across the room. When they stopped, he peeked over her shoulder. “See?” It was his turn to say.

The black fabric had somehow stretched to cover her. “But it’s still flowy,” she said, perplexed.

“Magic!” he said, releasing her to pop his hands open in front of her. He expected her to roll her eyes, but she was gleeful and pranced around his bedroom instead, testing the spin and flow of the fabric. If his heart beat any more gently at the sight, he might have to go ask the chihuahua for a cherubim uniform.

“So,” she said, when she’d finally contained her joy over the swishy fabric, “clubbing on a Wednesday night? You almost tricked me.”

He pulled her onto his lap. When they were alone, she didn't get uncomfortable with his need for closeness; for that, he was appreciative. “No, I’m a demon of the utmost sincerity. I would never trick a lovely heart like you,” he said, honeying his blatant lie. “You must be mistaken. I’m sure we discussed it over the weekend. Your memory must be a little hazy still.”

The hands in his hair weren’t so gentle anymore, the breath at his throat just a little too hot. “I remember everything,” she whispered to him, her lips barely brushing his earlobe. He knew she was faking it, but he closed his eyes anyway when her breath caught with pretend lust.

“You little vixen!” he cursed, squeezing her before forcing her to dismount.

“Asmoooo, you’re taking so long to get ready. What’s distracting you so terribly today?”

A towel being wound between his hands into a makeshift whip had her out of range quickly.

“You can be such a pretty pain,” he said. “Go find the new shoes I picked out for you. They’re in a box under the bed.”

He turned back to the mirror to finish his own makeup, only to be distracted by her image bending and reaching.

“Is it the black box?”

“No.”

“The pink one?”

“No, don’t open that.”

“Is it the sparkly one?” she asked, sliding still more boxes out from under the bed to surround her.

“No, it has stripes.”

‘At least she’s only asking about the shoe-box sized ones,’ he thought. ‘She might not be ready to see what else I keep under there.’

“Green and blue or purple and orange?”

“What? No, black and white.”

She was half way under his bed now with no light, only her legs sticking out. “Are you just fucking with me, Asmo?” she called out, her head suddenly protruding from under the bed skirt at the base board to fix him with a stern eye.

“I swear on my skin care regime, it’s in there.”

She ducked out of sight, muttering; he was sure she was complaining about how hard done by she was.

‘Watching her wiggle herself out backwards was worth the wait though,’ he thought. A shame he’d dressed her first.

The box came to him first to be opened. They’d learned the hard way, not long ago, that humans did not always enjoy the box stuffing that protected new shoes, nor was it always safe to touch.

Asmodeus fished them out and she looked at him suspiciously as he dangled them in front of her.

“You’re suggesting I wear flats to the club?” she asked. “Who are you and where is my Asmodeus?”

He tossed them at her to distract her from the butterflies she had given him calling him hers. The avatar of lust, or god of pleasure, did not blush at the possessiveness of mere mortals.

“Point your toe when you take a step,” he instructed when she’d finished donning them.

Visible confusion was obvious in every movement she made. She looked like a cat wearing booties.

“Stop thinking and walk,” he said and so she did.

“They adjust to the height I need?” she asked finally, sitting down on the floor next to him to tilt her feet overhead.

“You like to tempt fate, don’t you?” he asked.

“No, just you.” She tilted her legs to one side to look at him and smile cheekily.

He leaned forward and grabbed her knee, pulling her closer until the heel of her shoe grew to a long sharp point that threatened his face.

“Getting clever,” he muttered. “It’s lucky I want to keep you.”

She said nothing but lowered her legs and stretched out on his floor, waiting for him to finish his make-up routine. He’d already patiently done hers and tugged at her hair until it fell just how he wanted.

He hadn’t meant to say that he wished to keep her. He’d been through more lovers than he could count and almost never had he considered wanting to keep one, at least not for long, and not in this way.

It was difficult to decide what pushed her over that particular wall and separated her from the others. Her presence felt like the giddiness of a first kiss, but he would happily sleep in her arms, even if he wasn’t allowed to touch her any further. It was unnatural. He didn’t know what to do with it. But when she was here, it didn’t seem to matter if he did anything with it. She was already with him and he was smiling too stupidly to care otherwise.

“Come here,” he said, picking up a fine tipped brush, “let’s do something about that bruise on your neck.”

She expected an over the top cover-up, but he dipped the brush in a pot and the tip came out red.

“Trust,” he said, mocking her usual words when she side-eyed the red-filled pot. “You’ll still be the second prettiest person there no matter what I paint on you.”

It was difficult to hold still as the paintbrush tickled at her throat. ‘What is he drawing?’ she wondered. ‘That better not be blood.’

The room seemed empty without his usual innuendos and the sound of his voice.

“Sing for me?” she asked.

“Do you want me to put on my latest track?” he asked, pausing in his work, brush held aloft.

“No, I just wanted to hear your voice. It’s lonely in here without it,” she said, gesturing to the room around them. “Maybe just hum something? What’s the tune you hum when you’re making breakfast? I like that one.”

He collected more pigment on his brush without needing it and hummed quietly as he worked, glad when she closed her eyes. So simple a request shouldn’t make the butterflies in his stomach beat their wings so hard and pressure pink into his cheeks. It would be embarrassing for her to see him like that. Wasn’t he supposed to be the sure one in this regard?

Her fingers tapped on her thighs in time with his melody as he tried to work quickly. Usually he loved all attention on him, but right now, he shifted under it uncomfortably, even with her eyes closed.

“All done~” he said, and he let her turn slowly from side to side to view his handiwork in the mirror. The bruise remained, and over it he’d painted a delicate choker around her neck. It was slightly wider than Leviathan’s hand and extended past the borders of the bruising in intricate patterns. The red stood out starkly against the yellow, and glittered in the places it had pooled and hardened into firm dots. The solid lines still looked wet to her as she moved, but they were dry to the touch.

“It should get a bit darker as you get warmer at the club,” he said, taking a closeup of his creation. Their connection to the server seemed to be down, but he’d post it later.

“I love it,” she said.

“Good, then pass me the pink box and give me your arms.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to Dalektable for their fearless drudgery to bring you this chapter. They went over this not once but twice for us! <3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable


	61. ...For a Human

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon is not a fan of MC's club wear. Beel has a difference of opinion.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to Dalektable for their beta reading.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

Their entrance to supper was full of giggles and smiles, but they separated: Asmodeus returned to his seat and she to her usual one between Mammon and Beelzebub’s empty chairs.

No Leviathan in sight, though. ‘Isn’t he on dinner duty? He should be here.’ She texted him, concerned, hiding her D.D.D. in her lap.

* * *

**b357fr13nd5 Chat (2)**

**MC:** I thought you made dinner tonight? Aren’t you going to join us?

 **MC:** …

 **MC:** You’re not avoiding me again, are you?

 **L3VI:** No!

 **L3VI:** No, definitely not. I just need some down time.

 **L3VI:** Mammon has been pestering me, trying to find you for half the day.

 **MC:** Oh. Sorry!

 **L3VI:** How did you manage to avoid him? He only has one brain cell but he’s practically a bloodhound when it comes to finding you.

 **MC:** Levia-chan, don’t be so mean to Mammon, even if he can’t hear it. You’ll hurt his feelings.

**L3VI:**

Loading ‘Attempting to Give a Fuck.gif’

 **MC:** *Unimpressed Demoji*

 **MC:** Talk later?

 **MC:** I could use your ears.

 **L3VI:** I’m marathoning ‘Problem Children Are Coming From Another World, Aren't They?’ tonight, just let yourself in.

 **MC:** No password?

 **L3VI:** I said just let yourself in. Don’t make it weird.

 **MC:** *Kiss Blowing Demoji*

 **L3VI:** What did I just say!?

 **MC:** I think you said, send me lots of pictures of your skimpy clubbing outfit.

 **L3VI:** I’m going to have to deep clean my D.D.D. STAAAWP.

 **MC:** You have an entire library of eroge games. Anything I send would be nun-like in comparison.

 **L3VI:** …

She stares at the device, waiting for any further response.

 **MC:** Levi, you have a nun sub-genre don’t you? That’s why you’re not answering.

 **L3VI:** JUST EAT YOUR FOOD, NORMIE.

 **MC:** That’s Henry 2.0 to you!

 **L3VI:** Henry would NEVER say these things!!!

* * *

A loud “ahem” brought her mind back to the meal and she rapidly placed her D.D.D. facedown on the table.

“Sorry,” she said. She didn’t bother to give her reasoning to Lucifer; he didn’t want it. What he did want was no electronics at the table.

As she waited and tried not to squirm under his scrutiny, the stern look showed no sign of abating. Thankfully, the arrival of Mammon and the twins took the attention away from her, with Beelzebub immediately piling food high onto his plate even before sitting.

“What are you wearing?” Mammon said loudly next to her.

“A dress,” she said, also reaching to fill her plate. Leviathan never skimped on the human-edible food when it was his turn to cook, so she wasn’t going to miss out on the variety.

“Asmo! It’s practically a shirt!” Mammon said, still standing and turning between the two of them. “You can’t go out in that. Beel has longer shirts than that!”

She looked over at Beelzebub who had paused, fork half way to his mouth to see what Mammon was shouting about.

“He’s also twice my size; of course he’d have longer clothing than me, Mammon,” she said, her voice still calm and reasonable. “Besides, I’m practically a billboard that says don’t eat me or else.” She held up her forearms for him to see the infernal messages scrawled there in red pigment, courtesy of Asmodeus.

“You can’t be serious, Asmo!”

‘Did Satan just laugh his drink out of his nose?’ she wondered, trying to peek past Mammon who was leaning as far across the table as possible to point his finger at Asmodeus. She’d have to ask him what her arms said; the script was different from what she’d learned to read.

“No one is going to look at your arms. They’re going to take one look at you and eat you!” Mammon said, swivelling back to her.

“I think you look nice,” Beelzebub said, his eyes roaming over the black and burgundy, her mouth stained red to match.

“Thank you, Beel!” she replied, genuinely happy to hear a compliment, especially one that might undermine Mammon’s complaints.

“See Mammon. I look fine. Please sit down and eat? I’ve been looking forward to supper with you.”

It likely wasn’t her ego stroking that eventually had him pull out his chair. She suspected it had something to do with a look or gesture from Lucifer as Mammon had tensed all over before sitting.

She’d have to thank Lucifer later. ‘Maybe he could offer advice on how to better handle Mammon,’ she considered, before recalling the welts she’d found one too many times before. ‘Well, maybe just a discussion on consolidating Mammon’s debt instead.’

Goosebumps rose on her skin despite the warmth of the room. The fires had been stoked quite high; she'd noticed on the walk from Asmodeus’ room. The Little Demons had become quite particular when it came to the temperature of her surroundings, and she had no reason to feel cold. She looked around and tried to find the change. It had become important to listen to that little whisper of doubt that said “run” or “danger,” even when her mind told her it wouldn’t be polite or reasonable.

Satan was diligently fixated on ensuring new additions to his plate didn’t touch the old, Asmodeus was humming happily to himself over some sweet morsel, and even Lucifer had returned his eyes to his plate, cutting into the tough outer layer of some meaty dish.

The chill came from Belphegor boring a hole through her with judgemental eyes. She couldn’t tell if he wanted to peel off her sparse clothing with his teeth or lock her up in his attic. Maybe both, if the way his gaze roamed over her was anything to go by. Well, at least she’d managed not to make Beelzebub jealous.

Her D.D.D. buzzed a few more times but she didn’t dare to look at it, finding intense interest in what she thought were mashed yams on her plate instead. She hadn’t yet had a lecture from Lucifer about the pool damage and almost dying, and she didn’t need to put a larger target on her back. Besides, the angels were never picky about how long it took her to respond, and nearly everyone else who messaged her was already at the table.

“Why don’t you come along, Mammon?” Asmodeus asked sweetly.

Suspicion was on every face that turned to him. Asmodeus never wanted to share attention, any attention, but especially not attention that was difficult to obtain such as hers.

‘What is he playing at?’ Mammon wondered.

“You know, two pairs of eyes are better than one to protect our pretty exchange student.”

It sounded believable, but the way he rolled his fingertips into his palms, pinky to pointer, when he mentioned pairs seemed somehow lewd.

‘That idiot,’ she thought. ‘Is he trying for a threesome again? He just doesn’t give up!’

“Making sure she doesn’t get eaten is my job…” Mammon said, making a show of giving it thought. “I guess I’ll have to go.”

She wanted to plant her face into the table. ‘Why does he still pretend?’

Satan was watching with interest now that his plate was arranged, while Lucifer looked as though he was doing his best to blend in with the wallpaper and pretend the show before him didn’t exist. Helpful. Very helpful of them.

Her breathing was shallow and measured, giving away little of her feelings. It hadn’t been like this last week. Things were tipping into something uncomfortable. She didn’t have to scrutinize every expression or guess at motives before. ‘This isn’t a change for the better,’ she thought.

“We’re going to look so good going out~” Asmodeus said, between tiny mouthfuls. “I mean, it’s impossible not to be amazed by my beauty, but I get to show off some arm candy too!

“Not that you aren’t gorgeous, darling,” he nodded to her, “but I think I’ve really outdone myself on polishing her up. Don’t you think Mammon?”

Oooh. She could see that sly look in his eye. But at least Belphegor had stopped stripping her naked with his eyes. His intense glare shifted to Asmodeus at “polish”.

Mammon held his breath as he turned to his left and looked her over. “Yeah, Asmo,” he said distractedly, “she looks nice...for a human.”

Her left pointer finger tapped where it lay on the table, slowly growing louder as she processed his words. It had drawn Beelzebub’s attention and she could see in her periphery that he was turning towards her even as Mammon was turning away. She could only imagine that Asmodeus was about to throw something at his older brother.

“Mammon,” she said quietly, looking at him with tired disappointment, “I forbid you from saying ‘for a human’ when you compliment me or any activity I participate in ever again.”

She turned back and took a bite of the stuffed chicken breast on her plate, shaking her head at his stubbornness, even as she debated whether she should try to protect him from the tension that now suffused the dinner party.

“I didn’t realize humans were as fragile on the inside as on the outside,” he said, his arm around the back of his chair to better direct the barb at her.

‘So much pride stuffed in all of these demons. It’s hard to believe only one of them is the avatar of it,’ she thought, breaking the calm facade and rolling her eyes. ‘How much longer will he act like this?’

Her hands slid from the table and fisted at her sides, but her anger was still quiet. ‘Why can’t feelings be as easy with him as our adventures are?’

“I think you should take some time to reflect on your rude attitude before you return to the table,” she said, staring him down. It was difficult; their eyes never faltered like hers did, just shifted colours slowly, mesmerizingly, disarming her when they could.

“Ahem.” Lucifer again. She was facing away from him, but whatever his cough had conveyed it was enough for Mammon to leave the table.

“I should have given him glue sticks instead of chapstick for his birthday,” Asmodeus muttered.

Her hand had grabbed Beelzebub’s wrist, as much as she could get her hand around it, and stalled him from pushing his chair back as well. She didn’t bother to chide Asmodeus; he was a welcome distraction for the table and it hid her sudden attachment.

“Lucifer,” she said, getting his attention. It was difficult to tell if he was still annoyed. “Have you had Cerberus since he was a puppy?”

A smile. Perfect. He hadn’t expected the question at all; another point for her chaotic approach to life in the Devildom.

“Yes, he was very docile then, only about the size of a baby elephant,” he started, leaning back in his chair. “ I remember the time…”

Satan was joining in on the story now, something about chewing up Diavolo’s favourite carriage, but she couldn’t concentrate on it as Beelzebub slid his hand into hers. His effort felt more poignant and tender after having to deal with Mammon. She gave him a small squeeze in return and tried to listen properly while his thumb caressed the back of her hand.

“Asmo, you won’t mind if I borrow you before you head out for the evening, will you?” Satan asked quietly, his face a mask as ever.

“No, no not at all. So, long as I don’t keep my company waiting too long,” he whispered back, to avoid infringing on the story.

It was no problem for her. She needed to pick out a purse still anyway, which actually meant narrowing it down to six for Asmodeus to choose from.

The hand in hers was too soothing; as excited as she was to go out, he was making it very tempting to drag him into bed to nap and cuddle, if her bed weren’t broken. She released his hand but he didn’t let go.

‘Oh,’ she remembered too late and tried to look for conversation between the twins, ‘have they been “talking” this entire time? They’ve been suspiciously quiet.’

Beelzebub seemed irritated, if the set of his jaw was anything to go by, but Belphegor had that smirk again.

She heard her name before she could make any more of their exchange, and it dragged her attention back to Lucifer. “Are you even listening?” he asked, unsatisfied with her participation in the conversation.

“Sorry,” she said, smiling apologetically, “I just had something that tasted particularly strange to me. It was quite distracting.” She reached for her water and drank while they began their puppy stories again. This time everyone joined in.

* * *

She moved to help bus plates to the kitchen. Usually, she would do a quick wash up of the easy items for whichever brother had cooked and leave the rest to them, but Asmodeus would likely roast her alive if she dared get soapy water on herself tonight.

The last load of small plates were in her hands as Beelzebub managed the platters. As soon as she had set them down in the wash basin, her hands were stolen away, held in place by Beelzebub to frame his face.

“Don’t listen to a word Mammon says,” he told her as she got lost in his eyes. His hands left hers to stroke down her sides repeatedly, slowly feeling the textures of the black fabric. “You look absolutely beautiful.”

“That’s very sweet of you, Beel,” she said.

“I mean it,” he said, pushing through the discomfort of his shyness. “Rudeness and cruelty are the weak man's imitation of strength; don’t let his struggle weigh you down, too.”

His expression reminded her of when he’d first kissed her: uncertain and restrained. ‘How can he be so shy with me even after lunch?’ she wondered.

“It’s very unfair,” she said, thoughtfully, a wry smile on her face.

“I know, but one day he’ll come around.”

Her smile grew wide and amused. “No Beel. I meant you.”

His eyebrows shot up in confusion and she realized that surprising demons was quickly becoming her favourite pastime. “It’s not fair that you can be handsome, sweet, and wise. How is anyone supposed to resist that?” she teased.

“Hopefully, they won’t?” he said, his voice a bit higher than she was used to hearing. He looked so intent, his fingers twitching at her sides. “Will you let me kiss you?” he asked.

“Stay here,” she said without a hint to her answer, and walked away from him towards the pantry.

He’d remained in his place but had still turned to watch her go and return with her step ladder. She set it just in front of him, and stood on the third rung before cupping his face. It wasn’t fair to always have him bending in half and she was getting more than a bit tired of being moved around like a doll after months of it.

Now roughly eye height with him, she leaned into a soft and unhurried kiss. He pulled her into his embrace after a few moments and she teetered on one foot to accommodate the change.

He had asked if _he_ could kiss _her_. It seemed only fair that he be allowed to choose the type of kiss, and she didn’t protest, even if he was lifting her again.

“Beel,” she called softly when his mouth began to travel to her jaw and ear.

“Right. Sorry,” he said, pressing her away and balancing her again on the ladder. His words were soft and a bit rushed as he looked at his hands. “You’re just very beautiful and very underdressed for dinner. Are you sure you wouldn’t rather stay home tonight?”

She shook her head and began climbing down the steps. “For someone so clever, you’re either exceptionally blind or an excellent fibber,” she said. “No one would call me beautiful in the company of angels or demons, but it’s very sweet of you to say nonetheless.”

“I mean it,” he said, his hand capturing hers on the support bar and halting her descent. “To me you are perfect.”

“Beel, stop,” she said, growing uncomfortable with his insistence. “White lies are one thing,” she said, placing her hand over his mouth when he looked like he would continue, “but you should give them up when they become obvious falsehoods.”

He frowned deeply. It was not an expression she was used to having him turn on her. ‘Is he actually angry with me?’ she wondered.

“Climb back up the steps and I’ll tell you a secret,” he said, but he still looked angry.

It was a few seconds before she moved to do as he asked and she waited there until he wrapped his arms around her again, this time not for a kiss, but to whisper quietly in her ear.

“I wish you could see yourself the way I see you,” he said, stroking her back slowly. “I can't explain your eyes, or how the sound of your voice means I can't relax in the best way, or how your smile makes my heart stutter.”

It felt surreal. There was no way he really felt that way, right? She knew this wasn’t an amusement for him; he just wasn’t the type. But she’d thought that it was an extension of his friendship, nothing more.

Belphegor lurked in the doorway, staring as Beelzebub kissed her cheek and moved to whisper in her other ear. The heat of his blush against her cheek was even warmer than her own. “I can't help how every time I'm with you, I don’t feel empty inside. To me, you are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen.”

She blushed deeply when he faced her again, self-conscious with him for the first time in a long time.

“I don’t like that you doubt yourself,” he said, “but it hurts when you doubt my word.”

“Sorry, Beel.”

Remorse was obvious in her when she couldn’t meet his eyes and it made it all the harder for him not to hold her to him again. “It’s okay, I forgive you.”

“You’re going to be late if you don’t get going,” Belphegor said, leaning against the door frame lazily. His annoyance seemed weak, but he still pulled her down the step ladder and out of the kitchen anyway.

Her bedroom was only a few steps away but he kept her there, just out of sight, listening as Beelzebub sighed loudly, folded up her step ladder, and exited out the other side of the kitchen.

“You are getting much too cozy with him,” Belphegor said, now leaning against the wall and holding her there with him.

“Belphegor, no one is cozier with Beel than you are. You’re not really in a position to be complaining.”

“That’s different,” he said with a grimace.

“Other than your “twintuition” and that fact that you have history together…” she started. “Actually, you know what, it doesn’t matter. Either way, please decide if you want to be upset with me or not. I’m getting a bit of whiplash here from your sweet words and then iciness.”

She wasn’t angry per say, but their tug-o-war and his evasion of her questions was fatiguing. Picking out a purse and escaping with Asmodeus to blow off steam was becoming more and more of a necessity.

“I’m not angry, if that’s what you’re asking,” he said, trying to keep the sulkiness out of his voice as he continued to keep her from leaving the circle of his arms. “If you need something, why not say it?”

Her attempts to pull away from him stalled. “The only thing I _need_ is for all of you to be happy,” she said sadly, “and you two have put me in an impossible position that won’t allow for that.”

He pulled her closer, bundling her against his chest, her feet between his as he continued to lean and took her with him. “I’m sorry,” he said, his lips against her hair, but the rumbling in his chest sounded different, more stubborn. It roiled with frustration and selfishness.

“You’re playing dirty,” she said, relaxing against him.

“This time I don’t mean to be,” he promised in both languages.

“You should let me finish my sentences when we’re talking.” She poked at his unprotected neck. “I was trying to tell you that I wasn’t upset at seeing you two together, but you kept deciding you already knew what I was going to say.” Her last poke smooshed his cheek until he captured it between his teeth.

His tongue moved softly along the pad of her finger before letting her withdraw it.

“Then I’m extra sorry,” he said.

“Really, because your little growls vibrating into me say you’re mostly amused and pleased.”

“I never should have taught you how to listen,” he pouted, looking away. She thought she heard him mutter something about them not being small.

Getting onto her tiptoes with some difficulty, she reached his jaw and left a kiss. “Quit being a grump. I would have stayed to watch if I hadn’t already been dealing with Leviathan.”

He couldn’t hide his shock under his hair with her so close below him.

“What?” she asked, almost offended by his surprise. “I’m not a nun.”

‘Although Levi might wish I were. Maybe I should cosplay that and make him faint one day,’ she thought, sidetracking herself.

Belphegor’s laughter was cathartic and relieved, drawing her back into the moment.

“Ugh, all this time I’d been worried we’d disgusted you and driven you further away.” The sigh he let out seemed to settle him. He felt cozier around her, less strained.

“Asmo’s right,” she said, “you do have the nicest smile.” Usually, he hid behind her when he made this expression; it wasn’t often she was able to see the faint blush he had now.

He rolled his eyes. “Clearly, we just need to clone you,” he said. “That would solve everything.”

A snort of disbelief left her. “If that were possible, Beel would already have 10 clones of Barbatos.”

“Then just be mine,” he said, mopily, wiggling her from side to side until she smiled.

“You are a brat,” she said through her laughter. “I don’t know how Beel puts up with you.”

“Easy. He lets me get my way early on.”

It was her turn to roll her eyes. “I see how well that’s going for you.”

The irritated twist of his lips returned. “Just be safe tonight,” he said, and pressed a kiss to the top of her head.

“I doubt I’ll be able to unglue Mammon from my side.”

“Good. And so you know, I’m keeping a tally of all of your favouritism with Beel,” he whispered to her.

She opened her mouth to protest, but he’d already started listing them on his fingers. “Let’s see, there were still two kisses before to catch up on. Hmm and I know I saw one more in the kitchen just now, not including the ones on the cheek.”

“You can’t be serious,” she giggled.

“Oh very,” he said, although his tone was playful. “I greatly look forward to going down on you now that I have an excuse to do it soon. And twice at that.”

She almost went bug-eyed and clapped her hand over her mouth, only withdrawing it to chastise him. “Belphegor!”

“I do so love when you say my name,” he said, just barely stroking the back of her neck, while his other arm still held her in place. His lips hovered over hers before he nudged her gently, brushing their lips together.

Her mouth was on him, insistent, with only that brief invitation, but he pulled away shortly thereafter. It was just too weak for him to be sure, but he could have sworn she whimpered when he forced them apart.

“You should get ready to go before I decide you can’t leave without every inch of you smelling like me first,” he said, straightening up and propelling her towards her own door.

She opened it with a second glance back at him, but he was gone. He spoke to her in ways no one before him had. That’s what made it impossible for her to not want to listen, she realized.

“Took ya long enough!” she heard from inside her room.


	62. No, All of Them are Dangerous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Getting to the meat of the problem.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to Dalektable for their beta reading.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

“Mammon,” she said, “what are you doing in my room?” She glanced around as she walked in, but mysteriously, her discarded clothing was missing from the floor. ‘He hadn’t found them had he?’

“Where were you, huh? Been lookin' for ya all day!”

No, there was no way that would be his first question if he’d found her panties next to the wall and her skirt on the other side of the room. “Probably the same place your tact was hiding,” she said, deadpan.

“Well, it wasn’t under your clothing because it's been coverin’ nothin’ lately!”

“What does that have to do with you being mean to me?” she asked with more force than she’d meant. “I could be naked, but that doesn’t mean you should lash out at me, especially not in front of your brothers.”

“You don’t understand anything,” he said, walking closer to her from where he’d been pacing. “I’m just trying to protect you. Why can’t you see that?”

She brought a hand to her forehead. This was getting them nowhere.

“What do you want from me, Mammon?” she asked tiredly, “What will it take to make you happy--or at least make you stop policing my clothing as if you were my father?”

“I need you to stop doing stupid shit!” he said, and she watched his wings flicker into existence.

She stepped back. “What have I done that is so stupid?” she asked.

He gestured furiously at her outfit.

“My clothing again,” she said, tight lipped. “Okay. Can you explain what about my clothing upsets you, Mammon?”

The hoard of words were almost a visible thing, as they all tried to tumble out of his mouth at the same time, blocking one another. “It’s like you’re begging to be eaten,” he settled on.

“I’ve been to quite a few clubs here, and you’ve never had a problem before. What’s changed?”

“Nothing’s changed!” he said, trying not to yell. “I’m just tired of it.”

‘Be patient. Be patient,” she coached herself. ‘We can get answers this time, I can feel it.’

“Just to make sure I understand,” she tried to speak calmly, “you’ve been upset about my choice of clothing for a while now?”

His demon form stopped flickering around him, and he looked a little sheepish, but it quickly fell away. His sour expression still remained. Did he think she was making fun of him with her questions?

“Can you explain better for me why my lack of clothing makes you angry?” She wouldn’t give him any leading questions, he wasn’t going to get an easy out.

“You don’t seem to understand how shiny n’ tantalizin’ your soul is to demons,” he said, dragging his toe on her floor, “and when you pair it up with next to nothin’, it’s like you’re shouting out that you’ve gotta death wish.”

She nodded, thinking over what he was saying, wanting him to know she was listening, rewarding the way he was simmering down.

“So you’re worried about other demons outside of the House of Lamentation, then.”

“No!” he spat out. “Why can’t you get this? Every demon is a danger. Even them. Even me.”

Her feet didn’t move but it was obvious to him that she’d shifted away and disengaged from his words.

“I appreciate your protectiveness--”

“No, you don’t. You don’t understand at all. These are demons. Even my brothers. They are wolves.”

The set of her jaw told him she was stubbornly refusing his argument. She didn’t need to say it.

“You’re welcome to leave my room,” she said, pointing to the door. “I don’t let your brothers insult you in front of me and I won’t let you do it either.”

He stomped closer to her, pulling her hand back down to her side. She could feel the angry heat at her cheek bones, pressing against her, telling her her blood pressure was dangerously high.

“Mammon,” she said, her eyes wide and uncertain, “you’ve almost transformed.”

Her hand dropped from his grasp and he stepped back.

“What will you do if Leviathan gets worse than he was?” he asked. “What will you do if one of them attacks you?”

“I’ll tell them to stop,” she said, as if it were the most common sense thing in the worlds.

He had her pinned against the wall without another word, his hand covering her mouth. “Now what? You can’t say anything because you’re drowning or your throat has been crushed. What will you do then? You don’t ever think--”

There wasn’t even time for a yelp. Mammon was on his knees and ten feet from her.

“Stop thinking that I’ll stay weak forever,” she said, her voice shaking, though whether in fear or anger, she wasn’t sure. “Stop thinking that I will stay ignorant forever. I’m not the person who first fell through that portal.”

She caught her breath and walked forward, sitting down in front of him. Had she accidentally silenced him as well?

“I lift my unspoken commands,” she said, trying not to shake with the adrenaline coursing through her.

“What in the nine rings was that!”

Had he really thought she’d never considered her own weaknesses?

“I’ve been working on trying to project my commands with just thoughts…” she said quietly. Why was she nervous revealing this to him? This is what he wanted wasn’t it? “It hasn’t been very effective until now, though, since I can only sense magic. It’s not mine, just what I can find.”

She drew her knees up, resting her head on them, and Mammon looked anywhere but at her.

“I’ve mostly only been able to make small suggestions, like nudging Satan to turn left instead of right when he’s looking for a book, or seeing if I can get Beel to pass me a particular plate. Kind of like finding a fishing line in the wind and pulling at it with the hope it’s attached to something.”

“ _Tch_. You still need time to find it and make those words in your head. Anyone could tear out your heart before then,” he said, laying himself flat on her floor and looking away from her exposed thighs.

“And no amount of cloth or armor will stop that or dissuade an attack, Mammon. I will always be a weak and easy target!” she said, and waited in the following silence.

He still hadn’t fully relaxed, still wouldn’t look at her. She straightened her legs so that her shoes prodded him in the shoulder. The ceiling was going to melt if he kept up his glaring.

“I have told you so many times that I like you and it’s clear that you like me in some way. It’s clear that’s why you’re upset about my vulnerability, but Mammon, we can’t keep doing this.”

“You don’t understand anything,” he said and sighed loudly. “It is my duty to protect you, whether I like you or not. And that means protecting you from all of the scum of the worlds.”

“I’m an idiot,” she whispered mostly to herself and rolled on to her knees, crawling the short distance to him.

“Well, I’m glad we can finally agree on--hey, hey what do you think you’re doin’! I’m angry with you, remember?”

“Mhmm,” she said, as she lay herself across him and pressed her ear to his chest.

“Tell me how you feel about me,” she said.

“I mean, you’re okay for a h--” he choked on the final word and she tried not to smile about it.

“Say it in Infernal Speech,” she said, her fingers pressed into his side and shoulder for emphasis.

“I don’t see the point’a that. It’s not like you’ll get it.”

“Try for me? If you can’t, just tell me you want to protect me?”

His choking had nothing to do with a command now. She couldn’t see, but there was no doubt he was embarrassed.

Tentatively, he brought his hands to her back, almost hovering rather than touching, and she listened as closely as she’d ever tried before.

There were notes of pain. She recognized how self-loathing felt when it oscillated through her. But then there was also joy. It was strange to attribute such a beautiful feeling with a sound like earthquakes. A reedy little accompaniment, sickly and discordant threaded throughout. It was sour with jealousy, a common refrain she’d heard from Leviathan.

The arms that had been so cautious before were heavy on her now.

“Thanks, Mammon,” she said quietly. “I know I didn’t understand everything you said, but I think I have a better idea now.” She didn’t move until he started to overthink and his hands sprang away again.

Upright, and still leaning on her hip towards him, she fidgeted with her fingers and watched his confused expression. “You don’t believe me when I say I want you by my side?”

His eyes were wide but still focused on the ceiling. “There’s nothing to believe,” he said, his voice beginning to strain.

“Why? Do you think I’m lying?”

He rubbed a hand over his face before letting it fall to his side again. “I don’t think you’re lying, unless it’s to yourself,” he said, his voice was lower, almost as if his feelings were sinking too. “You’re just confused. It’s just Asmo’s magic. There’s no reason to want scum like me.”

His fist clenched on the floor, where it lay between his side and her hip. “I’m just your guard dog, even if I did want that kind of relationship…” he trailed off, embarrassed. He’d said too much already.

She wished he’d look at her. Where was the demon who joyrode with her and sold Lucifer’s tea to strangers on the street? She wanted him back.

“Asmo’s magic wore off a long time ago--”

“You can’t know that for sure.”

“Mammon, you’re pushing me away at the same time that you’re telling me I can’t be near anyone else. Humans aren’t built to survive like that. So, I need you to stop either one or the other if we’re going to move forward, even as friends.”

“What if I do want you all to myself?” he asked without spirit. “What if I’m greedier than I am now, what then?”

Her hand came up to rub at her other arm in discomfort. “Then, you’d have to tell me what you want that to look like,” she said. “Is that never looking at or interacting with your brothers again? Because that’s impossible. For one, they’d team up against you--”

“I don’t care.”

“Mammon, you know it's not that simple either. What about--”

“I told you, I don’t care,” he said, sitting up quickly to pull her head against his chest again. “I don’t care if it starts a war. I don’t even care if I have to lock you up to keep you.”

She froze. “Mammon, that’s not funny.” Her voice, full of fear, only made him hold her more securely. “You can’t say things like that.”

He wasn’t certain which one she thought was worse, but he wouldn’t look at her, even as she struggled to remove herself from his locked arms.

“You have to know I wouldn’t be me anymore if you imprison me.”

He flinched. “I know.” His expression was still partially visible before he huddled further around her. Shame.

“I wouldn’t be the me I am any more if I can’t be with all of my friends.”

“What if I want more than friends?” he whispered, and she attempted to stroke his cheek.

“I know that you don’t think of me as a thing, but you’re treating me as though I’m a toy you won’t admit to liking, but also won’t share with your brothers. You’re not treating me like a person you want to be with. Even without the politics, I can’t be more than friends if you want to hide it, or if I have to stop being me for you.”

Sullenness is all she got in return.

Her D.D.D. buzzed next to the wall, where she’d dropped it, and she carefully began to unwind Mammon from around her. He seemed to have come to some resolution within himself by the time she left a peck on his cheek.

He stopped her as she was reaching to give him the usual accompanying hair tousle. The shadow of his wings fell over them as he transformed and kissed her back down onto the layered carpets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello my wonderful readers. I have been writing and posting a minimum of one chapter a day for the last ~45 days. <3
> 
> However, going forward, I will only be able to update every three days. I hope you'll all still tune in for the next chapter on April 1st.
> 
> <3


	63. Back to Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon and MC finish the majority of their discussion before they're interrupted by Satan.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to Dalektable for their beta reading.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_Reaching to give him the usual accompanying hair tousle, he stopped her and the shadow of his wings fell over them as he transformed and kissed her back down onto the layered carpets._

Mammon’s hands pulled at her, encouraging, begging her to clutch at him as desperately as his mouth pursued hers. It was hard not to reciprocate, but she knew she couldn’t. Not like this. Not when he was desperate to put any sort of claim on her he could. Beelzebub and Belphegor’s expressions clouding her mind helped to cool her further. It was embarrassing; with the months of constant touch and touching between her and Mammon, there were definite pent up emotions and wanting. If the twins hadn’t tired her out earlier, she might have met Mammon’s kisses eagerly until she came to her senses. If she came to her senses.

She called his name, gently, trying to rouse him from his place at her neck, the pigment ringing her throat growing hotter everywhere his tongue journeyed.

“Mammon, stop,” she said, and he paused momentarily, only to renew his actions more slowly.

“I like you, too, Mammon, but you deserve more than this. Please stop.” Had he been hoping she’d command him one way or the other?

“Why?” he gasped out, his forehead against her shoulder. “Is it because of Beel?”

“No,” she said, but she’d paused for too long.

“Do you think I don’t notice how quickly your bruises disappear?” he asked, his hand firmly pressing down her side to her hip, the one he knew she’d injured.

She didn’t shy away. “I--”

“I know how much concentration it takes for him to heal nowadays,” he swallowed thickly, still shielding his expression from her.

The pressure on her hip squeezed tighter. “Mammon, you’re going to hurt me.”

His hand landed flat on the carpet next to her. “I know that he has to, at the very least, think about every bit of you, likely has to feel most of you against him,” he gritted out.

“It’s not--”

Blue eyes stared down at her, the gold mostly drowned out. “I know and I don’t care,” he said, taking in her stunned expression. “Just say you’ll be with me forever and I’ll believe you.”

She reached for him, but he wouldn’t come down to her, waiting for her answer. Propping herself up, she tried to thread her fingers into his hair, but he caught her hand again. She waited, and he relented, letting her smooth the hair at his temple.

“You will always be my Mammoney,” she said.

“That’s not the same,” he said, closing his eyes to better feel her hand in his hair as it brushed against the base of his horn. Or maybe he closed them against her words; she wasn’t sure.

“It’s the most I can give right now.”

Her D.D.D. buzzed again.

“Apparently, rock bottom has a basement,” he sighed, sitting up and away from her, looking at her D.D.D.

“Don’t run away,” she said, her hand still outstretched where it had been petting his hair.

He puffed out his chest and it strained against the belts that held his cropped jacket on. “Who’s running away? I don’t care how complicated this gets,” he said, jerking his thumb to motion at himself before his bravado faltered into something else. “I-I still want you with me.”

“Are you okay?” she asked, as once again he was sitting but refusing to look at her.

What did she even do with him? ‘How do I comfort someone I just told I can’t give them the kind of love they want?’ she wondered.

“I’m fine.”

“Really?” she asked, sitting up as well. “You don’t look fine.”

“Then stop looking!” he spun away from her, still seated, and ran his fingers roughly through his hair.

She made her way closer, until her knees bumped his lower back and she could drape her arms over his shoulders. His back was warm against her stomach, and it soothed some of her heartache.

“I’m glad you want to stay,” she said. It was hard to try and give him space when all she wanted to do was comfort him. “You promised no refunds after all.”

The sensation of a kiss on her forearm told her she was forgiven for now.

“I know we’ll figure this out,” she told him. “It’ll just take some time.”

He kissed higher on her arm, showing her his profile. Unsmiling and downcast.

“Will you still come out with us tonight?” she asked carefully.

“You can leave it up to THE Mammon to show you a good time,” he said, but the usual confidence was lacking.

“Good,” she said, quietly returning the kiss at the juncture of his shoulder and neck. “I was so mad at Lucifer when he stole me away at the last party. I’d wanted to dance with you.”

His wings quivered when her mouth made contact. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

They’d get over this hurdle she knew. He just needed some time to figure out his feelings and what to do with them before they could tackle all the other troubles together.

“Can I still come to your room later tonight?” he asked.

“I’ll be mad if you don’t,” she said, looking behind herself at her new replacement bed. “It’s much larger than the last one and it would be terrible of you to make me sleep in it alone.”

The D.D.D. rang instead of buzzing and she made her own little growl of frustration into Mammon’s neck. His wings flapped as he floundered under the sensation, but she didn’t release him right away, nuzzling the place she’d kissed until he’d relaxed again. The call could wait.

Eventually, when it continued to ring, she clicked her tongue against her teeth and crawled over to it. She had to hand it to Asmodeus, this dress continued to do its job of covering and swaying.

“Hello?” she answered. “No, sorry. I didn’t have it nearby. Mhmm. I’ll stop by on my way out. Yes, shortly.”

Mammon quickly flicked his gaze up and away from her rear as she turned to sit against the wall and give her phone a dirty look. “I’ll have to meet you downstairs. It seems I’m on my way to my third, no, fourth, lecture of the day.”

He bit his tongue and nodded, trying not to get caught staring as a deeper flash of cleavage showed when she moved to stand.

Having scooped up a purse, she dropped her D.D.D. into it along with a few things from her vanity and made her way to the door. But Mammon was still sitting, having watched her bare legs crossing the room back and forth.

The smile he gave her was disarming. He loved that she always smiled back at him; when he wasn’t being hostile, she always smiled as soon as she saw him.

“Go on,” he said, pulling off one of his boots. “I’m just going to break in your bed first.”

Her shock and giggle were what he wanted.

“Don’t break it,” she called back as she left.

* * *

“You rang?” she said as she waltzed through Satan’s open bedroom door.

“Yes, there are three things I wanted to go over with you before you go out tonight” he said, shifting books aside and clearing off a small table.

“Asmodeus isn’t with you? I thought…” she started and trailed off.

“Leviathan asked him for input on something. But back to me.”

“Yes, sorry. Go on?” He’d never called her before a night of dancing before. Was he also going to demand something ridiculous like a ‘Do Not Eat Me’ sash?

“First, I am very, very angry with you, but I didn’t want to talk about it until I knew I could keep it under control.”

“O-okay,” she said, nodding along as he cleared another chair for her to sit in. That was not what she had expected, but at least he hadn’t waited long. She’d already been apprehensive about it coming out of nowhere after his warning.

It wasn’t long before Rancor was batting at the hem of her swishy dress, distracting her as it retracted a centimeter at a time to stay out of claw range.

“You--” he cleared his throat and paused for a moment, trying again. “I felt hurt and angry when I realized you had abused my magic and used it outside of its intended purpose.”

“That makes sense,” she said, as she sat down. ‘Is he using “I” statements?’ She shouldn’t be surprised, if anyone had found ways to de-escalate difficult situations it would be him.

“You are never to bar me from saving you again.”

“Okay,” she said. That seemed pretty reasonable. She had been very careless.

“Ever,” he demanded, not realizing she had already agreed. “Okay? Yes. As it should be.”

She nodded at him. He still had two other points to get to after this and it was best to hear him out entirely. He’d clearly rehearsed this speech beforehand, and being interrupted was one of the things that irked him greatly. She tried to give him a chance to say it all by shushing Rancor’s persistent mewing.

“If you ever even think about stopping me like that again I will ask you to recind our pact.”

The seriousness of his words weighed on her and she didn’t resist when her shoulders naturally folded inward. Her legs would have drawn inward as well if Rancor hadn’t flapped up into her lap to head butt at her and purr.

“I understand,” she said quietly without meeting his eyes, focusing instead on the way Rancor’s fur felt.

Satan pulled up his chair in front of hers.

“I don’t think she likes it when you raise your voice,” she said.

“Rancor’s fine with me raising my voice; she hears me yell at things all the time. She doesn’t like me raising my voice to you, ” he said, reaching out to pet the pantheptera.

“I really am sorry, Satan,” she finally looked at him. “I’ll try to rely on you more.”

“Good,” he said, and distracted himself from the promise in her words by scritching Rancor’s chin.

“I don’t see anything deep other than your neck bruise,” he said, starting their conversation anew. “The smaller ones on your arms don’t seem bad at all. Unless Mammon knows about some covered ones that I don’t?”

She detected the tiniest hint of cockiness in his voice and the way he arched an eyebrow.

“Were you hoping they were worse, or hidden?” she teased.

The small bit of mirth fell from his face.

“Too soon, then.” she said, pressing her lips together as if sealing them. “Sorry.”

Rancor hopped across the gap and into Satan’s lap, pawing at his chest.

‘I am a lucky human today!’ she thought, as the cat played mediator.

Eventually, he set the kitten aside and addressed her again.

“Secondly, since we are now certain that you can draw magic out of inanimate objects, as well as act as a conduit, I’m going to send you out with a little bit of both for self defense tonight.”

He was pleased as she perked up at his words; her interest in the occult always cheered him.

“Put your hands on the table,” he said, fishing some notes out of his pocket. He gently turned her hands over to face palm up, making a peeved expression on seeing Asmodeus’ writing on her forearms.

“This may sting, but it shouldn’t be too bad,” he said, and she shut her eyes, waiting, but the sting never came.

‘What is he doing?’ she wondered. ‘It feels like he’s writing on my hand using a slug or a small oily sausage. Should I ask? He might need to concentrate on what he’s doing.’

She peeked her eyes open and would have retracted her hand immediately if he didn’t already have a firm grip on her wrist. Blood welled from a cut just below his thumb, which he continued to dip his free hand into in order to write on her palm.

“Satan?” she asked, her voice full of concern. Rancor purred as she rubbed herself around the human’s ankles.

“You’re fine,” he reassured her quietly, never taking his eyes from his work.

She couldn’t see what he was seeing, clearly. By the time he laid down the next line of script the previous had disappeared into her skin.

‘What the fuck is this!’ she practically chanted in her mind. ‘Keep it together. Don’t embarrass yourself. No fuck that, politeness gets humans killed here!’

“Satan, I’m trying not to freak out, but you’re bleeding on me,” she managed to say fairly evenly.

“Just a bit more on this side and I’ll be done,” he said, his voice soothing. Too soothing.

It took her a moment to recognize that there had been a continuous, deep, hum resonating in the room. She knew it wasn’t Rancor, who was now trying to sleep between her feet. It was too deep for that.

Her jaw unclenched as she realized it was Satan. Whatever he was saying was nice but too low for her to completely comprehend. “Safety” seemed to be at the core of it though.

“One done,” he said, turning her palm down onto the table and pressing a nail into the meat of his other thumb. “Now the other.”

“This is so many levels of weird, Satan.”

“Hmm. Perhaps. Or it is very normal and you’re simply not used to it.”

“Is that how you talk all your partners into kinbaku?” she asked with a gleam in her eye.

“Stop that,” he said, startled by her sudden interest. “I almost misspelled.”

Surprising demons was definitely going to become a sport for her.

“Are you sure you’re okay using your blood as an inkwell? That can’t be good for you.”

He was ignoring her now. Another hand turned over and she was amazed to see that without him prodding at the wounds, they were quickly coagulating. “I need you to stand up,” he said.

Looking down, Rancor was still asleep across her shoes. “I can’t,” she whispered back.

“Rancor,” he cooed, petting the winged kitten’s head. Sleepy mraows met him as she stretched and yawned. “Bring me a fresh nhushtan when you next go hunting?”

Like a black bullet she dashed away and out through a compartment in the wall. She never needed an excuse to hunt, but it was serving Satan’s inventory counts well.

“New cat door?” she asked. “It has an…”

“Air lock. Yes, humidity and books don’t go well together,” he said, and began stripping off his jacket, sweater and shirt.

“What are you doing?” she asked, her voice loud even to her ears.

“Finishing the spell,” he said, as if this were nothing out of the ordinary. “Keep your hands on the table for now.”

‘If this is a sex thing he’s in so much trouble,’ she thought.

Two loud thunks and there was a brassy coloured snake dropping from the mouth of Rancor above them.

“Still alive and mostly unharmed,” he said, examining the creature as it spit at him and coiled around his arm. “Very well done. Someone is getting extra treats tonight.”

She wanted to smile at the cuteness and the craziness, but there was a hissing serpent very near her and her hands were, for all intents and purposes, stuck to a side table.

The serpent was grasped firmly by the head and Satan looked at her. “The next step requires cooperation,” he said.

“Will you ask me to relinquish our pact if I say no?” she asked warily.

“No, no, not at all,” he said, looking around for a place to put down the serpent.

She could tell he wanted to comfort her. It was the hesitant dance he did when he wanted to initiate contact, but wasn’t certain how best to go about it. And right now, he was shirtless and had an angry snake in his hand. Extra hesitant.

“Okay,” she said, “I’m trusting you on this, but if my hands get blown off, Diavolo is going to be very upset.”

The genuine smile he gave her was short-lived as he used the snake's fangs to pierce the skin of his chest and drag it across to the other side.

‘Is that what he meant when he warned it might sting?’ She flinched away.

Throwing the snake in the air again did not settle her nerves at all, but she had said she would trust him. ‘How many times has he thrown snakes in the air for Rancor to catch it like that?’ she wondered as the pantheptera flew off with it into his closet.

Concerning.

“Hands up,” Satan said, drawing her attention back to the task at hand, and waiting for her to mimic the position of his own open palms facing her at shoulder height.

She brought her hands off the table and with alarm watched them drip in front of her. It felt slick even though she didn’t flex them. The rumble from him grew louder, even more so as he told her to come closer.

He pulled her forward and forced her palms to either side of his sternum, smearing his magic from the centre point and out to his shoulders.

This was so many kinds of not good. Lucifer would definitely want to discipline them for this.

“Remember: cooperation,” he said. “Try not to fight against it even if it is a bit…unforgiving.”

She nodded, doubting he’d be able to hear her over the thrum of magic and his own Infernal mumblings. How could it be so loud but none of the papers around them stirred at all? At least the Little Demons she saw had the sense to run for cover.

Her personal space was non-existent when Satan stepped forward, her hands still held under his. There were small, electric sparks firing around them before he pressed his lips to hers. She didn’t move until he licked to ask entrance to her mouth.

For a moment, kissing him was like testing a battery by tongue, but soon the metallic taste fled and all that remained was the fury of the storm.

They were across the room, though she didn’t recognize having moved, only that her back was now against the only wall without shelving. He allowed her to lift her hands when he cradled her face in his.

Everything around her felt charged. There was a small zap when their lips would part and meet again, or when hands moved away instead of sliding. Slivers of shock met her touch when she pulled him closer by his metal decorated belt. Which part of this was supposed to be unforgiving?

It felt like she was kissing life out of him, and possibly dangerous to stop.

Soon enough he’d drawn her hands back to the fading streak across his chest, and she could hear through the whirling around him what sounded like “my blood in your hands”. The rest didn’t make sense to her, too quick and too muffled for her unpracticed ear.

And like that, every speck of magic left the air. She would have thought she’d hallucinated the whole thing if her hands weren’t still on a partially naked demon.

“That was new.” she said, overwhelmed and bewildered.

He only had a cheeky smile for her before leading her back to her seat and redressing.

‘Did that just happen?’ she wondered. ‘How long have I taken in here?’

“Now, fourthly,” he said, taking his own seat, “you should know what Asmo has written on you.”

She brought the inside of her forearms up for inspection, still blinking owlishly at him. “Don’t you mean thirdly?”

He ignored her. “This one here says ‘I’m a human. Water only’ but the other one says ‘Property of Asmodeus’”.

Her mouth made an ‘O’. “That explains Mammon this evening then,” she said. “But at least I won’t have to yell over the music to get hydrated.”

“Always with the silver lining,” he replied, before eyeing his door. “But you are likely already missed.”

He walked her to the exit, his blonde hair disheveled and hands still encrusted with splotches of his own blood. “If you get into trouble, just press your hand against whatever is bothering you,” he said. “It should react to your needs and become a deterrent.

Once again she nodded along, not entirely sure what to say after accidentally becoming a part of a Satanic blood ritual.

“Be safe,” he said, shooing her out the door.

She turned to quash the now familiar phrase. It would likely be her epitaph.

“I know you always are,” he said, “but The Fall is a much larger club and it is easier to get separated there. Stay on the first floor.”

And with that, he closed the door in her face.

* * *

He was tired. The spell hadn’t drained him at all, but having her so near and cloaked in his magic, only to send her away, was taxing. He’d have a new fantasy to dally over from now on: pouring his sin into her, painting her in it, until she glowed with it from within. She’d be radiant.

‘A small rest and a good book is the panacea I need,’ he thought, walking away from the door.

But he covered his face before he made it to his chair. He stared aghast at his bed.

She hadn’t been choosing a deviant act at random to tease him about; she’d seen the coils under his bed, the book avalanche having poured the rope partially out onto the floor.

‘Smooth, Satan,’ he thought to himself before dropping down into the chair.

* * *

‘What in the Devildom have I gotten myself into today?’ she wondered, making her way to the front hall via the stairs as quickly as she could. It wasn’t like Satan to close the door on her like that. Not unless she’d really gotten on his nerves.

“There you are,” a deep voice echoed through the hall, disrupting her thoughts and her escape.

“I sense an impending lecture,” she said to Lucifer, somewhere behind her, her hand almost on the doorknob. “Would it be acceptable to request a milder berating since you will be my fifth one of the day?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please look forward to the next chapter on April 4th.
> 
> Just a quick recap for anyone trying to keep track of the woes and tribulations of Lucifer.
> 
> Reasons Lucifer has his feather's ruffled:  
> He leaves Wednesday Morning, she's making chocolate.  
> He comes back, she's got a flying cat.  
> He comes home and she's skipping dinner because she almost died while destroying the pool with Leviathan AND endangering Diavolo's exchange program.  
> He goes to bed and she knocks on his door. Has to wash her stupid hair again.  
> He tries to sleep. She speaks in a language he hasn't heard since their fall.  
> He finally falls back asleep, she wiggles around.  
> He expects to lecture her in the morning. She's gone back to her room and sleeps on the broken bed anyways.  
> He is trying to get everyone to have breakfast together and she comes down essentially wearing ownership tattoos all over her which are bound to cause a fuss.  
> Then, she moves to the other side of the table and He has to reign in Asmodeus again.
> 
> 24 hours. She's just chaos to his schedule. It's a miracle he doesn't have ulcers after months of this.
> 
> She manages not to do anything or implode for a while - to his knowledge.
> 
> She comes down to dinner with Asmodeus dressed to kill and wearing "Property of Asmodeus" on her. Mammon starts a fight because of it.  
> It's been too quiet today, only two arguments and he hasn't lectured her yet. So she sends sparks through his gloves.🤯  
> She makes a joke about sliding into Diavolo's DMs and Lucifer almost becomes apoplectic.


	64. The Fall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon, MC, and Asmodeus arrive and spend some quality time at The Fall.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to Dalektable for their beta reading.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_“There you are,” a deep voice echoed through the hall._

_“I sense an impending lecture,” she said to the voice at her back. “Would it be acceptable to request a milder berating since you will be my fifth one of the day?”_

“You smell like blood,” Lucifer said, moving around her to search for any sign of injury.

“Yeah, yeah I guess I do,” she said tiredly as she let him look her over yet again. This was becoming a strange habit between them.

After all of this, her hair was going to be a mess by the time she got back to Asmodeus. “Today has been another weird day,” was her only explanation.

He frowned at her, as he reviewed her hands and forearms for the second time. “Saturday odd or Wednesday odd?”

“Less dangerous than either, I think?” she said, “but stranger.”

Her answer had not reassured him, she could tell. He hadn’t yet released her hand, though he had stopped inspecting it.

“Your talking-to can wait. If Mammon and Asmodeus are left alone too long the narcissistic one-upmanship will spiral out of control.”

‘Did he just crack a joke?’ she thought, and tried not to laugh overtly at his observation.

“Actually, Lucifer, I was wondering, if you’re still awake when we return, would you be available for a short chat?” she asked earnestly. It was still difficult to keep eye contact with him sometimes and she wished, for the hundredth time, that sleepy-Lucifer would make an appearance. “I could use your advice.”

She’d said the magic words.

“Of course,” he said, trying to puzzle her out. “Just knock.”

“Thanks,” she said with a relieved smile, pushing the door open ahead of her and slipping her hand from his.

Static nipped at his hand through the glove as she left and it only grew his concern. Should he force them to remain home? He stood on the stoop, watching them flag down a carriage.

His D.D.D. buzzed to life in his pocket.

* * *

**Fragile Human +1 Chat (2)**

**MC:** Don’t worry, I invited Lord Diavolo too!  
**Lucifer:** I have to assume you weren’t fool enough to invite him publicly on something like Devilgram.  
**MC:** Of course not! Everyone knows to slide into Lord Diavolo’s DMs privately.  
**MC:** *Winking Demoji*

* * *

He almost crushed the device. ‘How dare she make light of Lord Diavolo as if he were some—some trifling floozy!’

She waved out the window of the cab at him, her smile flashing brightly under the moonlight.

‘No, she was probably just teasing me,’ he realized. ‘She is not the sort to disregard power and status so easily.’ Raising a hand, he waved them off and both his warming cheeks and the grip on his D.D.D. lessened in severity. What was he doing? He’d never seen his brothers off before for something as trivial as a night out.

He waited until he closed the front doors safely behind him to rub his face in hands in consternation. ‘This troublesome child is even harder to deal with than Mammon!’ he lamented. ‘She has all of them at her beck and call after reuniting us.’

A foul mood was brewing in him. He didn’t like uncertainty and right now, he couldn’t tell if she was the lighthouse for them or the storm.

* * *

“ _That_ is the purse you picked?” Asmodeus cried out as he helped her into the cab of the carriage.

She eyed the nuckelavees warily. Dark and dangerous, they were hitched tightly to the front of the carriage, but she still took Asmodeus’ hand quickly to escape their sight.

“Shut your upper dick-hole and get out of the way, Asmo,” Mammon said.

“Mammon!” she scolded. Clearly, he hadn’t checked his previous frustrations at the front door even after jumping on her bed.

“There’s only one way to do that~” Asmodeus answered, pulling Mammon into the cab. “Are you offering?”

“Fuck off, Asmo,” he said, taking his seat next to his human.

She sent Asmodeus an apologetic look and he bit his retort back for her sake.

‘How she puts up with that moron I’ll never know,’ he thought. “But seriously,” he said instead, “ _that_ purse?” His face scrunched up in distaste.

Rotating the purse in her lap to show the other side of it, his attitude seemed to turn with it and he delightedly clapped his hands. “Oh, it’s that one! Never mind then, just keep that side out.”

It didn’t matter. It would be checked at the front and remain there for most of the night anyway.

Mammon looked out the window, elbow on the sill to support him as he held his chin in hand, ignoring the stream of innuendo that endlessly spewed from Asmodeus. He was only doing this for her, there was nothing at The Fall for him right now. Nothing except her.

Asmodeus had his hands in her hair when Mammon looked back.

“Asmo, how can you possibly style hair while the carriage is moving?” she asked as they went over another uneven portion of roadway.

“It is a talent,” he said. “I call it the gyroscopic prayer pose. Very useful for other things on your knees~ I can teach you later if you’d like.” So used to innocent marks like her flustering and stumbling to agree or protest shyly, her laughter caught him unawares.

“You’re cute, but you don’t need me to feed your ego. You’ll have to find someone else tonight.”

Mammon sat up from his place at the window and slid his arm around her, pulling her toward him so that Asmodeus was no longer directly in front of her. Not that he could see it. Still looking outside, he wished he could press the cold glass against his hot cheeks.

A finger to her lips shushed Asmodeus’ complaint before it sprang forth. He wouldn’t dull the twinkle in her eyes, even if his Mammon was scum. He just needed to wait patiently and rope him into the club.

“Mammon, you’re so warm,” she said, knowing he blushed harder at her words.

“If you dressed in more layers you wouldn’t be cold.”

“Will you dance with me tonight?” she tried.

“You ask too many questions,” he complained, but he sat her in his lap and pulled the edges of his jacket around her. “I-I’m only doing this so you don’t freeze to death before we get inside.”

She tried not to wiggle her toes, or anything else, but her triumphant expression conveyed her thoughts to Asmodeus easily. ‘I’m winning.’

* * *

Eventually, he had to let her go and his hands moved to the flare of her hips. His thumbs rested further back from his fingers than polite, but he mumbled something about helping her up. She let it slide when he didn’t release her, instead letting his hands glide down her curves as she stood.

“Just don’t make it a habit,” he said, when she thanked him for his warmth. “You’re heavy.”

The sound of her trying to stifle her laughter threw him off. He’d missed that while they’d been at odds.

“Asmo, help me out of the carriage?” she said, stepping down and out. “Mammon says I’m an overweight heifer.”

Her feet never touched the ground as Asmodeus lifted her up and spun her instead.  
“Impossible~” he cheered, “you’re light as a feather.”

“Hmm,” she replied happily as he set her down on what were now heeled shoes. “He must need some fortitude training then,” she gossiped quietly to the avatar of lust.

“Oi, you two, quit whisperin’. Asmo, hands off!” The last thing he needed was for Asmodeus to set a bad example for other demons. No one needed to be touching her at all. Unless it was him. ‘For protection,’ he told himself, but it sounded weak even to him.

She linked her arms in both of theirs instead and pulled them toward the entrance of the tall purple building, ignoring the line up out the door. Her walk, and the way she collected them oozed confidence, but just looking at the building as it seemed to sway and move on its own, she was already feeling trepidation, and the smallest spark of something uncomfortable in her stomach. ‘Stay on the first floor,’ she reminded herself. ‘Tonight will be a good night.’

Their entrance could not have been less conspicuous. Asmodeus was the life of the party and wherever he went the excitement and cheer went with him.

“Hector, you remember my brother,” he drawled to the cloakroom clerk. “Well, this is my human, don’t let her get into too much trouble.” Asmodeus’ wink and instruction seemed to rock him and he nodded rapidly, clearly lovesick.

“I’ll be right back,” Mammon said nervously, and he disappeared without any further discussion, the crowd swallowing him quickly.

“Must’ve seen a creditor,” Asmodeus joked, tugging her along with him as if he were impervious to the pounding bass around them. Compliments and selfies along the way slowed their passage, but there was no stopping Asmodeus once he was in his element.

It was too loud to talk without being pressed to someone’s ear, but Asmodeus greeted the bartender with a kiss to either cheek, after moving through other demons, four deep, to get to him. Without a pause, he swooped back to pull his human in front of him, lifting her arms to show off his calligraphy work to the bartender, who nodded with appreciation. ‘Someone finally appreciates my talent!’ his elated expression shouted to her.

Threading his hand in hers, Asmodeus pulled her out onto the dance floor and all of the terrible parts of clubbing faded into the background. The crowds parted ahead of him and a universe of beautiful bodies, pulsing music, and sexual frisson opened up before them. No hands reaching out to cop a feel and vanish again. It was just her and the music and the way her thoughts melted away in the sea of bodies and sound. The perfect hiding place.

The DJ was high above them, orchestrating the sound-orbs to float, strobing in time with the music. Different colours illuminated them as they were briefly frozen in time, like a polaroid that showed a new way for Asmodeus to be handsy with each flash. Here, amongst the warmth and the lights, it seemed like it wasn’t within his control. The music required it of him. It no longer seemed out of place as his hands wound around her, pulling her against him. He made her silently gasp, finding new ways to casually place his lips on her exposed skin.

The bass resonated through everyone, moving them on the same wavelengths and vibrating them down to their spines. Dancing alone was effective, but with others was better. She needed the ocean of movement to draw away her bottled anxiety, dragging it away like the tide.

Occasionally, another body would reach for her, hands with webbed digits, slick tails, or careful talons. It was sensual and unthinking and they would vanish as unexpectedly as they had arrived, wandering to a new partner. They helped her forget her worries with fragrance and motion for a short time, but she suspected their departures were due to the way Asmodeus always managed to dance just a little closer.

* * *

Navigating through a horde of grinding dancers, past tables of more beautiful creatures, she reached the bar counter. ‘It’s impressive how none of them ever spill their drinks,’ she thought.

Riding high on endorphins, fearless, she began to push her way forward. Looks of confusion and hunger were quickly replaced by laughter. The newest novelty, she wedged her way to the counter, stepping up on to the foot rail to adequately be seen amidst those towering around her.

Asmodeus’ bartender spotted her and tossed her a bottled water. Reaching into a fold of her skirt, she pulled out Grimm but he waved her off with a smile. It was nice to be reminded that not every demon wanted to eat her. Not everyone was a danger.

‘These shoes are a blessing,’ she thought as she squeezed her way out, their height adjusting without need for her conscious thought. They’d be amazing if she ever got tipsy, but for now they helped her avoid stumbling in front of all her new graceful partners.

* * *

“Always run,” Mammon had told her again and again. It felt foolish every time, so stupid whenever she ran. There was no obvious reason for her to bolt except for that quiet survival instinct. It had become so much louder and insistent here in the Devildom.

The cloakroom attendant was staring at her and tossed his head, motioning for her to come over. ‘He was friendly enough,’ she told herself. ‘Maybe my phone is ringing in my purse?’ He would have remembered her with Asmodeus. He should be safe, but she felt the hair on her neck stand up through the light layer of sweat and quickly scurried away.

‘What do I have to lose except for a bit of pride?’ she reminded herself as she found a place to sit. ‘Pride isn’t something I can use if I’m dead. Always run.’ Still, it was jarring to feel that way after just celebrating her freedom here, on the floor and at the bar. She needed to get back to dancing and drown her thoughts out in the rhythms again.

Without warning, another beautiful creature hoisted her out of the chair, holding her hand above her head and laughing with his friends. Her expression immediately communicated how unimpressed she was with the change. Raising an eyebrow, she twisted her lips and flicked his thumb. ‘Let go’ she mouthed to him, hoping he understood her language or that her body language at least was enough.

The songs here were in too many languages to guess at who spoke what. He looked confused and blinked at her, trying to focus on the script on her arm, but it didn’t matter. Soon enough, Asmodeus was leading a very concerned young demon away from her rapidly.

She sighed, relieved. Even if she wasn’t entirely safe, her babysitters were here, and most demons looked at her as a cute pet to be cooed over and not a lively appetizer.

A touch on her shoulder still startled her and water geisered out of the bottle in her hand. Oops.

Mammon peered at her over his glasses and grinned.

‘Speak of the Devil,’ she thought.

“I know you’re excited to see me, but you don’t have to throw out your drink just for that,” he said in her ear, just loud enough to be heard over the music.

She nodded and looked down, embarrassed, knowing it was impossible for him to see her apologetic smile from where he’d crouched down behind her chair.

He didn’t need to see her face to know something was off. When it came to her, he was always observant. She hadn’t relaxed, even though his hand had slid down to her elbow. “What’s wrong?” he asked, hunting her body language for clues.

‘How can he be so concerned, compassionate even, when it comes to a small discomfort like this, yet so incredibly dense when it comes to bigger, easier emotions?’ she wondered before turning in her seat to find his ear, her knees forcing him back a bit further.

“It’s nothing,” she shouted to him. “Don’t worry about it.” Part of her didn’t want to share it with him. She was feeling petty about his disappearance and about their previous discussion, even if it had ended well enough. The carriage ride hadn’t been ideal either. Maybe she should have uninvited him.

His stare was stony as she tried to wave him off. “Don’t lie,” he said leaning in closer to her than necessary. He’d seen her like this more than once, and as confusing as it seemed each time, her reactions hadn’t been wrong yet. Occasionally, nothing would come of it, but usually nothing good came along with the tension he saw in her neck.

The first time, they had been walking home together, talking about class when suddenly she was running back the way they’d come. He took a few more steps without her in confusion, before being grappled and pulled into the alley. It didn’t matter; they’d splattered under his fist in moments, but he was proud that she’d fled. She had listened to what he’d said when it was important. ‘If only she would start doing that again,’ he groused, trying to keep his hands from becoming fists.

It happened over and over; not always kidnappings, but dangerous pollen clouds, lava overflowing its embankment, stray hellbeasts, and to all of them she had the same reaction. This reaction.

He slid his hand over hers, covering it and portions of her exposed thigh.

“I’m not sure,” she told him, when she realized he wasn’t going to let her drop it. “I can’t decide what’s wrong.” The tendons of her neck flexed even as he watched her try to soften the rigidity of her shoulders.

His nod and partial squeeze of her hand let her know he’d heard over the dinn around them.

“Do you want to go home?” he asked.

“No!” she said. She needed this night out. This was her newest “under the bed” place to hide. Here she could hide even from her own thoughts, even with Mammon next to her.

“Alright,” he said, retracting his hand to rub at the back of his neck. “Stay close then.”

She took a deep breath and stood to follow him into the crowd. It was always overwhelming to wander through the jungle of demons, big and small, like birds of paradise, all acting their roles and broadcasting their personalities with their costumes and teeth.

The same thing that made dance clubs like this so pleasurable was also what made them a nightmare: never knowing who was going to be there, or why. It was possible to run into an old enemy, an old friend, an old friend who had become an enemy. Or even into an ex-lover, or your next lover. The stakes were all there, and that’s what made the clubs so attractive. After the music of course.

  
Following Mammon, she didn’t notice the bright colours and skin as much as usual; her eyes were on him as he pulled her along behind him. He controlled the quality of the chaos around her.  
They swayed together, a hand’s width always between them. She wasn’t daring enough to reach for anyone else here, but she was more welcoming to short side dances with others than Mammon seemed to be. The longer they danced near one another the shorter and shorter, those dalliances became.

  
All of the words to the music were still incomprehensible to her, but it would ebb and flow between spine rattling raving and slow sensual tempos made for private moments. Mammon was without concern, she could see: his newest partner moved like a fluttering ribbon around him until the tempo slowed even further and he released her into the arms of another.

Glancing around, she started to feel awkward as the crowd began to thin. The tables began to fill with less adventurous singles and the songs became slower. As she stepped to exit the dance floor, Mammon’s outstretched hand stopped her. He curled his fingers to tell her to hurry up, looking as if she were the one exploiting his good nature when she placed her hand in his.

They moved slowly, unhurried. His moods had become so difficult for her to predict; she found herself needing to ask, “Is this okay?”

“It’s fine,” he said, closing the distance in their embrace. “Just dance.” His answer didn’t fill her with confidence. Maybe she should have stayed home.

The DJ transitioned into something with a güira, and she tried to ask again, “Are you sure?” There were only two dances she knew that used it, and this didn’t sound like merengue. In fact, she usually sat out this kind of song due to its closeness.

He sighed, disturbing her hair, and cinched his hold as far around her ribcage as he could. This close, she became intensely aware of his blush, even under the shifting lights. She tried not to look as flustered as he did when he slid his right leg between hers.

It didn’t seem fair how easily his cologne reeled her in. He rolled her body along his and she tried not to imagine the same action in his bed.

This was not her strong suit, but even she could tell he was being overly careful. “I won’t break,” she told him and then they were moving faster, harder, more breathlessly. When he dipped her to the right he rolled her upper body until he raised her on the left, her cleavage on display as he lowered himself over her bent frame, his lips tantalizingly close to leaving a kiss between her breasts. Her heart beat faster than the rhythm could ever hope to keep up with.

Only with the occasional turn away from him did he let her leave his enforced closeness, preferring to lead her as if he were creating a wave through her body with his own. Grinding her on his bent knee, the inside of her thigh always in contact with his, she was starting to lose her thoughts more than ever before to a dance.

Dancing was something he excelled at, something his brothers never teased him about. “It’s an important skill for any warrior,” he’d told her when she complained about having to learn. “It trains agility, endurance, and grace.” It made much more sense now when she felt the way he moved.

His happiness rumbled through her even though she couldn’t see his smile. She let go of her worries and pains; in that moment, they were living and moving together, and nothing else seemed to matter anymore.

Every time she tried to gather some semblance of thought it fell away when his hip would drag her leg up to his side, as if promising to hold her there for better things, only to let her go again. She was surprised as he built wave after wave of want in her; she hadn’t been expecting to mime vertical coitus with Mammon.

‘My face must be red enough to see from space,’ she thought. ‘Distract yourself!’

“What is the song about?” she asked him as he brought her hands up to slide around his neck.

“I met you in the dark. You lit me up. You made me feel as though I was enough,” he said huskily in her ear.

‘So much for a distraction,’ she thought, trying not to focus on the arousal pooling within her.

“We danced the night away. We drank too much. I knew I loved you then. But you'd never know.”

If possible, she never wanted this song to stop. This was her Mammon, the one who had been missing for too long.  
“'Cause I played it cool, when I was scared of letting go, I knew I needed you, but I never showed,” he translated, running his thumb over her lower lip. She drank him in. If they hadn’t been dancing, she still would have been hypnotized by his eyes.

A roll of her head became a turn as he twisted her with his hands and forearm. Other than a few flourishes, and trying not to press her lips to his, she’d become his willing puppet.

“But I wanna stay with you, just say you won't let go.”

“I missed you,” she said into his neck.

He tilted her chin to look at him, moving only their hips. “I'm so in love with you, and I hope you know, darling, your love is more than worth its weight in gold.” His eyes never left her as he interpreted. Was she wrong to read into it?

He was getting far too creative with his moves, leading into patterns she associated with other dances. Her leg hooked around his waist as he pulled her upright, sliding his hand from the tips of her fingers down to her hip. She had to close her eyes at the sensation.

“We've come so far my dear, look how we've grown, and I wanna stay with you, just say you won't let go.”

Her back was to his chest just as quickly as she’d found herself wrapped around him, his hands rolling her shoulder blades as he swayed her and brought her lower and lower, grinding her ass into him.

“I'm gonna love you till my lungs give out. I promise 'til death we part like in our vows,” he gasped in her ear.

He spun her, and the feeling of his hands on her waist went missing until she stopped. Kneeling in front of her he grabbed her and pulled her to him, to straddle his thigh and arch her body as he kissed her slowly.

She wished they could stay like that, but the moment had fled and the tempo was changing. He helped her upright again, steadying her against him as they both breathed raggedly, though perhaps for different reasons. She doubted he was winded by the physical exertion.

“Thank you for the dance,” she said, pulling away. She watched him begin to reach for her and then stop.

“I’ve got some business to deal with,” he said, the spell broken. “Asmo is right there, so you don’t have any excuse for gettin’ into trouble.” Sure enough, Asmodeus was only a few people away to her left, giving her a look that screamed “I felt that from here!”

Then Mammon was gone, the warmth of his body evaporated. She swayed slowly to the beat as it began to pick up again. ‘It’s important to stay near Asmodeus,’ she told herself, and didn’t try to follow in Mammon’s wake. She knew how quickly he could move when he was fleeing her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I learned bachata, the history taught to me was that it was essentially the domain of comitted couples, or unrequited love, and the music was influenced by its surroundings: sex and despair. It is a dance done to express the feelings one has for another. It is believed by most, that the more smoothly and more frequently the hips are used and moved, the more feelings the individual has for the other. 
> 
> With that said bachata originated as a sort of “mating call,” if you were selected for a dance of bachata, you were chosen as a mate, two dances with the same individual, “sealed the deal.”
> 
> Something similar to the finishing move: https://youtu.be/vIgQ4eKGQks?t=243 
> 
> For anyone who is interested in actually seeing bachata:
> 
> https://youtu.be/-lqw2T9_2eI?t=47 Basic dips and rolls to see what that looks like in action.
> 
> In this video the dancers are sometimes out of sync with one another but it still gives a good idea of what you would likely find on the demon dance floor: https://youtu.be/v3NzDkQ33gQ 
> 
> This one is a good example of a faster paced bachata in a club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9Kn0Mqi1Fc
> 
> And another just for fun https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpQAEHiWwiU
> 
> The words Mammon is “translating” are from a bachata remix I heard of a song by James Arthur - “Say You Won’t Let Go”.


	65. To Send A Message

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC finds out what's really going on. But, where are her demons?
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge thanks to Dalektable for their beta reading.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_“Thank you for the dance,” she said, pulling away. She watched him begin to reach for her and then stop._

_“I’ve got some business to deal with,” he said, the spell broken. “Asmo is right there, so you don’t have any excuse for gettin’ into trouble.” Sure enough, Asmodeus was only a few people away to her left, giving her a look that screamed “I felt that from here!”_

_Then Mammon was gone, the warmth of his body evaporated. She swayed slowly to the beat as it began to pick up again. ‘It’s important to stay near Asmodeus,’ she told herself, and didn’t try to follow in Mammon’s wake. She knew how quickly he could move when he was fleeing her._

She didn’t need to migrate far to reach Asmodeus; he closed most of the gap for her, taking and relinquishing partners on his way to her.

“That was quite a show~” he said when he was close enough for her to hear. It was impressive that he managed to exude so much enthusiasm and carnality with all of his clothing still on. He had left a trail of partially clad dancers in his wake, but for her his hands stayed mostly respectful. “Did you have fun?” he asked.

She reached behind her to loop her hands behind his neck and they swayed to the music. “Comfort me,” she said, tilting her head back on his shoulder.

His rumble of frustration was tangible even with the bass shaking them. “You must be kidding,” he sighed in her ear before breaking her grasp on him.

“Comfort sex comes after you actually have something to be sad about, darling!” he said, and he spun her to better see her face under the dappled lighting.

“Does being momentarily forlorn earn me a pity dance?” she asked. That’s all she wanted anyways. Just someone to move with her and help her forget her concerns.

“You don’t need a pity dance,” he muttered through her messy hair, “but you can still have an amazing one with me. With me, there’s no other way to have it.”

She smiled and they moved with only instinct and a pinch of propriety to guide them.

“I’m glad you’re wearing it,” he groaned seductively. It made her eyes and other things flutter without her permission.

“The dress definitely does work,” she said before pivoting around him, alternating hands that pushed off his body as she circled.

He caught her arm as she stepped past him, collecting the other during her rotation, and pulled her back against him. “I didn’t mean the dress,” he said before he spun her into dizziness.

When the spinning stopped, she clung to him and he knew that for the moment her entire world was only him.

“Sweet boykin, do you really need praise for shoes? I could have sworn I already did that,” she said once it was only her body swaying and not her head.

She felt his tongue on the underside of her jaw before he dipped her. The heavy bass line dropped as she fell, and paused as he brought her back up, a baptism in infrabass. It felt like awe and fear, every movement slowed and dilated. All of the surroundings focused sharply around her, but all she could concentrate on were Asmodeus’ lips as they captured hers.

“You know that’s not what I meant,” he said, leading them further away from the floating subwoofers.

“And you said we wouldn’t talk about that outside of your room,” she admonished him before he could silence her again.

The tight line he pressed his lips into only accentuated the way his eyes glowed. “Later then,” he promised, finishing the dance with her before moving to their neighbour to wreak havoc there.

She found distraction in the company of the demons and demonesses around her. A number of them she recognized as students at R.A.D., but she didn’t notice when Asmodeus disappeared, only the same sense of foreboding she’d felt when they’d walked up to the building.

It would probably be best if she found a seat at the bar, or maybe on the bar counter; given how short she was, Mammon and Asmodeus might not be able to see her on one of the stools. At the very least, the bartender knew who she was supposed to go home with and would be able to keep an eye on her.

The lights and sound danced around her as she made her way to the edge again, bouncing off of glitter on her skin that she most certainly did not apply.  
She made her way to the edge of the bar, closest to the bathrooms and hallway. The throng of demons seemed thinnest there. Moving to attempt her access again, she hoped no one would lift her up to surf to the front. That had happened once before.

But a thick scaly hand came up to stop her. The three fingers of the hand were enough to push her back. It was then that she realized there was a wall of similar demons behind her as well, cutting off her return to the dance floor. All three behind her looked eerily similar, like copies in slightly different clothing. Something goat-faced but reptilian, covered in sickly purple-grey scales.

They didn’t say anything as she tried to back track, but more importantly, they didn’t move. Before she had time to jump away, the one that had pushed her back picked her up under its arm as if she weighed nothing. It was like fighting a boa constrictor.

Her soft nails dug into its flesh. She bit and struggled and kicked anything she could reach. Screaming for help when her teeth weren’t engaged. The clang of her shoe off of metal panels continued until it rotated her. She couldn’t think; all she could feel was the panic clawing at her insides. How many door frames had she clung to?

Cries for help went unheard over the music, and the rowdiness her kidnappers were faking, their arms over each other's shoulders in comradery, shielded her from view and drowned out her voice. She cursed their bodies, wide enough that no one could see her, as they slipped into the back. If they did see, no one cared.

‘No. No. No. No. No. I need to run!’

Their silence, outside of noise made to cover up her shrieks, was unnerving. Was she going to be eaten? Killed and then eaten? Tortured for information about their demonic lords, her pacts?

Her kicking and flailing continued until she was tossed into a room.

‘Stand up. Stand up. You can’t run unless you’re standing.’

The music was far enough away now that she could hear them speaking to one another in Infernal. The one that had carried her blocked her escape through the doorway as they rasped and gurgled to one another.

‘They’d never look for me back here,’ she realized, ‘or if they do it’ll be much too late. I need to get somewhere else. Anywhere else.’ She was panting from exertion and panic.

The room held cloaks and bags, all tagged, but she didn’t see the main counter they’d passed when she’d first entered The Fall.

‘Surroundings. Find a way out. Take stock: clothing with tags, a counter, a couch, a door. The door. There’s a second door!’ She launched herself at the door, banging on it with her fists, screaming for help.

Clawed hands pinched the back of her dress, jerking her backwards. That it had done so without ripping the material was miraculous. She fell hard, but the door opened. ‘Hector!’ Praise whatever angel was looking after her today!

Hector’s look of disdain when he saw her withered her hope instantaneously.

‘What are they saying?’ she thought frantically, skewing her ability to listen. Something about the door moving had brought him in? He was telling them not to be too loud, that she knew.

‘Why does every speaker have to sound so different in the same language?’ There was something to hide their sound? A spell? A muffling spell!

‘Oh no, a muffling spell… My D.D.D! This is the cloak room; it should be in here.’ She just had to look, had to think clearly.

“Now that we’re alone,” she heard as she was still scrambling to her knees. It brought its foot down, unshod and claw tipped where her stomach had just been. She had rolled away in time but didn’t recognize her purse anywhere. It was ridiculously gaudy. Where the fuck was it?

‘What kind of filing system do they use here? It’s all mixed up numbers! Wait, why did it bother speaking a common human language to me? Shit--’

This time, a kick to her hip sent her tumbling into the wall. Why was it moving so slowly? It could easily outmatch her in strength and speed.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked, not that she expected an answer.

It picked her up by the hair, slowly. “To send a message, of course.”

“Then why haven’t you killed me yet?”

* * *

Mammon leaned against the outside of the building, cigarette in hand. He’d managed to dodge his creditors again, but mostly he just needed air after being that close to her. Her scent had been mouth watering, rivaled only by the time he’d crawled into bed with her after Asmodeus’ magic had short circuited her.

For a brief moment, he’d watched her dance with Asmodeus and felt bile rise in his throat, but to his surprise, it fell away quickly. The way she moved with Asmo was sinuous and alluring, but it was nothing like how she had danced with him. Together, there had been no one else on the dance floor but them; watching her and Asmodeus was like watching her slowly get drunk on sin.

Still, he didn’t need to watch that. She’d be fine with Asmo for a bit. He seemed to be on his best behaviour with her tonight, which was fine with Mammon. She him shut down every time she had the chance, hadn't so much as batted an eyelash for Asmodeus since the incident. Besides, he had far too many other pretties that still needed to fawn over him before the night was even close to over.

Mammon’s D.D.D. rang and he fished it out of his jacket, holding the cigarette in his mouth, and saw Lucifer’s condescending expression light up on his screen. ‘Great. Just what I need,’ he thought.

“Are you keeping up with the human, Mammon?”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t worry about it. Both of us are here, I doubt anyone would try anything.”

“I heard from Asmodeus that you and your ‘master’ haven’t been getting along lately,” Lucifer said. “Are you sure you can handle this? I doubt you’re even in the same room with her, based on the lack of noise I hear.”

“Is that why you’re checkin’ up on me, Lucifer? If it is, I’ve got things to do. My break is almost over,” Mammon said around a draw on his cigarette.

“Very well. Diavolo will be in attendance tonight and I will be joining him, and you, shortly, in case you need another ‘break.’”

“I can handle this on my own, Lucifer. Butt out.”

“I’m already on my way, and will be there in less than ten minutes, but don’t expect that will mean you’re off duty.”

“Diavalo’s tits, get off my back already,” Mammon mumbled to himself.

“What was that?”

“I said, ‘Diavolo’s wits, it’s great to have him back already.’ Back at The Fall, I mean.”

“Of course. And, Mammon?”

“Yes?”

“Smoke kills humans. Put that out before you return to your post.”

“Understood,” Mammon said. His answer was tired but practiced.

The line went dead.

He sighed out the last of the smoke and ground the cigarette under his boot. Lucifer was going to tie him up to a chair covered in needles if he wasn’t at her side by the time of his arrival.

A nod to the front desk clerk and he headed back in, scanning the floor. The tables. The bar. Neither of them were in sight.

“Shit!” He never should’ve trusted Asmodeus not to try and fuck anything that could walk.

* * *

“Then why haven’t you killed me yet?”

It threw her onto the couch, using her hair to whip her forward.

‘Keep it talking. Buy time. Eventually they’ll notice I’m missing.’

“I’m great at passing on messages,'' she said. “Why don’t you just tell me what it is?”

‘If I’m lucky maybe my phone will ring.’

“Not to worry. Your broken body and broken mind will do that just fine.”

There was nowhere to move when it took a swipe at her; its reach was too long. She gasped, curling up, unable to draw breath around the pain. Even without claws it was like being hit with a battering ram. Coughing, she tried to crawl away on her arms and right leg, still holding her stomach.

But when it dragged her back by the good leg, they both noticed that its claws hadn’t punctured her. Its displeasure couldn’t have been more clear, even if its features weren’t human.

She screamed as it tried again, aiming for her thigh faster than she could process, but the dress dipped, covering her, and the claws were deflected again. A sickening crack from her hip reverberated through her.

Menacing laughter left it, but it sounded surprised. “The avatar of lust, wrapping his owner in chastity wear. He must hate himself more than we thought. No matter.”

She kicked and flailed and tried to get away, but its hand in the middle of her chest pinned her to the couch. This time the dress didn’t respond.

“Let’s leave it on, shall we?” it said, bringing its head closer to hers. She could see something bloody still between its teeth. Its breath was rancid when it washed over her.

“The trick is,” it said, letting the fear sink further in, “to let all ill will fall away.

Her eyes should be watering, but all she wanted to do was spit in its face with her remaining breath.

“Let’s remind Diavolo and his pets that they’re not untouchable, no matter how much armor they, or you, are covered in.”

It wanted her to crack under the fear and the pain first, she realized, and tried to quell the shaking that had started to take hold of her.

“Don’t move or it will be the last thing you do. I would like to send you back maimed, but alive,” it growled. She pressed desperately at its arm trying to push away.

Showing fear would only end her life faster but she couldn’t control the palpitations of her heart as the pops and creaking of her ribs and sternum got louder. Her palms were sweaty against its scales and her face was beginning to tingle.

She could hear the fabric tearing, but no pain burning her, only the ache of pressure against the bruising. Two patches of fabric fell away from her torso, exposing her ribs and belly. It’d cut out a heart, leaving a black strip of fabric straight down the middle.

“How artistic of you,” she strained to get out. The pressure against her chest was making her see stars. It wasn’t eviscerating her yet. Silver lining! Why was she giddy? Why did she want to take just a few short breaths and lie down? This wasn't right. She wasn’t thinking right.

“It’s difficult to keep humans alive but still hurt them,” it said, a spray of spittle landing on her face and chest as it continued to speak uncomfortably in her tongue. “Torture is an art of the mind and body. But don’t worry. This won’t take long.”

She didn’t feel reassured, instead she continued to tip between panic and numbness.

‘Art, art, art, why was there something I’m supposed to remember?’

Something. She just needed to calm down. She needed air!

Anything to get more air. She couldn’t see the fangs in front of her any more. Flailing, she barely felt when her right hand struck out at its snout and wet teeth.

A bit of light breached the purple splotches of her vision and she sucked in a breath and stumbled away from the couch, clutching the bits of fabric to her bruised torso.

Her sight began to clear but her eyes began to water as she pushed down the urge to vomit.

There was no chance of outrunning it or its friends at the door, but it was stunned for now. Trying to slow the thunder of her heart and the static in her head, she breathed deeply, looking at her hand. Satan had given her the tiniest of edges, and she couldn’t let it go to waste. She just wished she knew how she’d used it.

There was nothing to kill it with in here, nothing small enough for her to lift or bludgeon with. Where the fuck was her D.D.D.?

Its eyes were starting to flutter, both sets of eyelids.

‘You need to survive. This is stupid and impossible but do it. You need to survive. Take any chance,’ she coached herself.

Pulling down a purse from the jumble of tagged items, she approached the massive creature. Doubling down on her hopes, she dropped the pieces of dress cutout it’d created into its mouth before unclipping the purse’s heavy chain strap to wrap tightly around its throat. ‘If it doesn’t suffocate, maybe it’ll choke,’ she hoped.

Her shoes set on its shoulders where its claws would barely reach if it woke, she continued to cinch the chain tighter.

‘Please let this work! Please don’t be ’

It spasmed like a fish out of water: feet kicking and eyes rolled back and unseeing.  
Its arms flailed without aim. Maybe she was lucky and it was still unconscious, reacting as best it could without awareness.

The beast inhaled once and she tightened the chain, wrapping it around her wrists. The only sound coming from it was the rapid kicking of its clawed, webbed feet and a horrific whooping as it tried to drag air into its lungs.

Recognition started to dawn in its eyes and she strained even harder, pressing her right leg down with all her might for greater pull. Her stomach muscles felt like they were going to pop out of her body.

The kicking grew weaker and the sounds shorter. She waited, but only a single claw had made its way under the chain. Just in case she waited longer. Still nothing.

Releasing the chain, she stumbled to her knees, muscles shaking from the shock and exertion. Something was terribly wrong with her left leg but she was still able to stand and begin limping towards a row of cloaks. She didn’t have time to rest. Her D.D.D., that’s all that mattered now.

She didn’t hear anything before she was in the air, but it was easy enough to realize it hadn’t died, once she hit the wall. Her shoulder struck first first and she dropped back down onto the couch. It had thrown her as easily as a wiffle ball.

“You’ll regret that,” it said, stalking towards her. The chain she’d used was in pieces on the floor.

“JUST DIE ALREADY!” she shrieked in desperation.

Chunks of demon, scales, and blood exploded from its chest and covered her and everything behind her in its spatter. The bits of bone that flew through the air hung for too long, moving too slow, as her thoughts began to race.

She couldn’t convince herself to move yet, as her hands here still shaking in front of her, held up to shield her neck.

‘There was no reason for-- Why am I--?’

Stunned, she was stunned. And then the silent confusion crumbled and fell away, her hands going to her face, and her stomach clenching. Her body was trying to curl up and cry. This was too much. Why was this happening?

Carefully, she lowered herself to the carpet to lean against the couch. She let her body shake even though it pained her more. Her eyes wouldn’t let anything else fall and her throat closed painfully. Her sobbing breaths sounded as laboured as her attackers had under the chain.

She tilted her head back, and a detached numbness started to blanket her. It felt warm. Her thoughts were still fuzzy, as though she were giving instructions to a small child, one at a time, but at least now they weren’t scattered.

‘How do I get out?’


	66. Make a Scene

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC tries to escape her captors
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't thank Dalektable enough for their help and advice with this chapter. They've been an amazing beta reader and very encouraging when my writing quality took a big hit due to illness these last couple weeks.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_Stunned, she was stunned. And then the silent confusion crumbled and fell away, her hands going to her face, and her stomach clenching. Her body was trying to curl up and cry. This was too much. Why was this happening?_

_Carefully, she lowered herself to the carpet to lean against the couch. She let her body shake even though it pained her more. Her eyes wouldn’t let anything else fall and her throat closed painfully. Her sobbing breaths sounded as laboured as her attacker’s had under the chain._

_She tilted her head back, and a detached numbness started to blanket her. It felt warm. Her thoughts were still fuzzy, as though she were giving instructions to a small child, one at a time, but at least now they weren’t scattered._

_‘How do I get out?’_

She hauled herself up, limping harder than before.

‘Small. Weak. Fragile. Slow.’ She avoided the quickly spreading puddle of blood. ‘That means be quieter. Be smarter. These are demons. Demons can think, can plan.’ Dread crept through her again like an icy chill, eating away at the numb warmth that kept her moving. The back of her knees were weak with it. ‘But just like humans, they react. And always MORE’.

‘Think. Think. Think. Think.’ She looked around once more for her phone, balancing gingerly as she rifled through the racks of clothing and bags.

‘What would Satan’s favourite detective do? They’d plan a distraction.’ Her hand stopped between coats, suddenly unsure of what she’d just been planning. She closed her eyes to focus. ‘Thinking like this can’t be good; it's only one thought, one step at a time, without forethought.’ She was running on instinct again.

At least it had her moving. It still hurt to breathe, or walk, or stay upright for that matter, but she had an idea now.

She wiped some of the blood off of her face, thankful she’d been partially facing away when the creature had erupted. Squeegeeing some of the goo off on to her hands, she pressed hand prints against the frame and door that led to the front desk. She slicked the handle and left prints on the wall.

Her were eyes drawn downward by a faint tingling on her stomach, where she should have been gutted. With amazement she watched strands of fabric slowly working their way across the empty holes, like tiny threads of spider silk creeping on their own.

‘How had that monster expected to keep me alive after a strike like that?’ she asked herself. Three oval shaped bruises, running light to dark from the inner ring outward, marked her. ‘That isn’t good. Shouldn’t there be claw imprints?’

She touched gently at her stomach and regretted it. ‘This isn’t the time to think or hurt. Be sneaky. Be smart. Keep moving.’

The mantra didn’t make dragging the large demon physically any easier, but it kept her focused. Her shoes squelched in blood and the beast’s clothing dragged differently against the carpet, catching bits of bone and grating. Every sound made her jump; her heart still pounded and her limbs shook as she continually double checked both doors, waiting to be caught.

Finally, having dragged him over to the hall exit, she had the difficult task of rolling him over. It had been easiest to pull him on his back. The jagged ribs hadn’t caught on anything; he bled less that way, but now her heart was in her throat and her body, shaking with fatigue, didn’t want to obey her as she strained to flip him over.

‘How long is the sound muffling spell supposed to last? Does it work both ways? Will I hear them coming?’ she worried as she tried to drag his body closer to the wall. The door needed to be able to open, which meant she needed to arrange the corpse just right, no matter how long she had to stand there. Closer to the door was closer to freedom, but also to two more demons, if not three, and the constant thought of the door opening slowed her progress.

Carefully, quietly, she used its own bloodied forelimbs to paint the frame of the door and wall, stretching the long arms to silently sweep next to the handle. She stepped behind the door. It was the same place Asmodeus had put her in his bedroom only a few hours ago, but now she had long coats and cloaks to camouflage her instead of a hard wall. The heavy fabrics lent her a small bit of comfort.

‘Be calm and thoughtful. Just survive. Calm and thoughtful,’ she tried to remind herself, still praying to some unknown entity to materialize her phone. ‘Just one step at a time.’

She reached forward and rattled the door handle, ensuring it wiggled on the other side. Waiting, still holding her stomach, she wondered how badly she would hurt when the fear wore off.

A cold sweat started to cover her body. ‘Slow breaths. No shaking right now’ she reminded herself. She jostled the knob again. And again. And again.

They might not be able to hear it, but they should be able to see it if they were still keeping guard.

It felt like forever, but eventually the door pushed partially open, almost politely as if to peek in. Instantly, a rolling howl filled the room. ‘Family. Vengeance. Pain,’ it seemed to say all at once. She felt it in the marrow of her bones.

‘Don’t run. Don’t run. Don’t run,’ she chanted in her head even as the sound nearly forced her legs to move against her will. ‘This must be how pheasants feel,’ she realized, her heart beating too fast for her to make out single beats.

Their eyes saw only the trail she’d created. They couldn’t see the empty cavity under the corpse, only the trail of blood leading from their kin across the room to the tiny human handprints painted on the wall and exit.

A grotesque noise, strangled and warped, sounded on the other side of the door from her; she didn’t fully understand it. It was too fast to comprehend, too twisted with pain and rage. The Infernal growl held something akin to ‘mortal,’ which had to be her, but there was more. ‘Maybe they meant Hector?’ she wondered. ‘Let them believe Hector betrayed them,’ she prayed to the sudden silence around her.

They were at the other side of the room before she could blink, two of them enthralled by their own rage.

‘Luck be with me,’ she thought and fled down the hall, limping as best she could. She heard the crash behind her. ‘Good, they’ve kicked in the door to the main desk,’ she thought.

Their attention was still away from her, but no one else’s attention was on her either. Panic was trying again to force out the strange calm and detachment that had flooded her earlier. ‘Where is Mammon? Where are they? Find me. Please find me.’

Everything inside her burned, but she was almost back to the bar. There was no third demon. There was **no one** in the back hall. Why?

* * *

‘What was Asmodeus thinking?’ Mammon was livid. He stormed up the stairs, a black cloud of anger seething visibly around him.

Wrenching doors open, he looked for Asmodeus and searched carefully for any sign of her. This was no place for a human. The smoke from the machines all bled into the floors above one another, each floor murkier than the last.

He didn’t even know what was in the smoke this week! Was it cotton candy scented? Was it an aphrodisiac? Was it just tinted blue on this floor? Did they mix safely? Were all smokes toxic to humans?

‘They couldn’t be on the floor above?’ he wondered, and slowly the anger bled into fear.

Now he hoped they were on the floor above. Anywhere else would be terrible or too late to collect her before Lucifer arrived. Or both. ‘She shouldn’t be here. I never should have let her go out dressed like that. I should never have brought her here at all.’

Four flights of stairs, dozens of private rooms later, and finally there was Asmodeus, laughing away, pouring bottles of gold foiled Brimstone’s Kiss without a care in the realms.

“Mammon!” he cried out, “come join us! We’re celebrating me! I didn’t know, but this is the hundredth anniversary of my patronage here~”

“Mammon?” Asmodeus asked, taking in the complete lack of attention directed at him, even as the party continued going on around them. Gold balloons erupted from a cake behind him. “Mammon?”

He’d held her broken and dying in his arms not so long ago; the same feeling as then flashed in the pit of his stomach now. She needed him and he’d lost her again.

He’d held her while her punctured lungs gurgled and she whispered to him that he’d be alright. Her hand had stroked the tears on his cheeks before it went limp. There was no way to have stopped that. There was nothing within his power that he could have done. He didn’t know the danger lurking then.

‘I knew the danger here and I still let her out of my sight! What have I done?’

Gone as quickly as he’d burst through the door, his heart-broken expression was the last thing Asmo saw of Mammon before he turned to leave.

Mammon’s wings erupted from his back as soon as the door closed behind him. He didn’t even remember using the stairs when he had stepped back into the bar and dance floor below.

There would be no punishment if he lost her again. Lucifer would have to put him out of his misery instead.

He had to find her. ‘I won’t let it happen again,’ he frantically promised himself.

* * *

She didn’t bother stopping at the bar to her right and couldn’t put the weight on her left leg to pivot that direction anyways. Stumbling past tables, she fell at the edge of the dance floor.

‘Good. Make a scene. Be seen. Someone. Please?’

Blood still pulsed in her ears. She looked behind herself and her stomach clenched. The demons she’d tricked had realized Hector didn’t have her. Their approach was like one of the horror movies that usually had Mammon hiding behind her.

She hoped Hector had died from their brief confusion.

It was clear that they had lost themselves to their grief: their clothing had rent itself in places as they ran on all fours, stretching the fabric in ways it wasn’t meant to move. There was nothing subtle about their intent, eyes glowed with a blue fire, demanding vengeance and flesh. The way the flames flickered lit up the angles of their goat-skulled faces even at a distance. Masks of death.

Struggling to get back to her knees was almost impossible; she couldn’t get her leg under her fast enough on the polished floor to stand. Everything was moving so slowly, but her thoughts were rapid. They were still coming for her.

‘Fuck it. I can’t move.’

They weren’t slowing down and patrons stepped, or were jostled, out of their way. She watched a table overturn and break in the wake of the first creature.

‘If I’m going to die here at least I’ll go down swinging!’ she thought, ‘Even if I have to extinguish its eyes while I’m bleeding out. I’m going to do it.’

With a final bound, the demon was falling through the air at her. Its shoulders were too wide to bother slashing at her with its claws; it would just bite her in half.

Everything was still so slow. She was going to puke. ‘Just get it over with!’ she wanted to scream.

Falling backwards she kicked out. Her foot never made contact with it, but her heel did. The pointed stiletto had extended further than she’d thought possible, skewering it through the eye socket and cracking through the back of its skull.

For a moment, she closed her eyes. The impact had sent a pulse of pain into her ankle and hip; it was the only thing reminding her that she wasn’t already dead.

Under the strobe lights, she watched the creature topple, taking her leg down with it. It was impossible to sit up, so she tried to roll. ‘Is it dead?’

‘Thank Diavolo that its snout was so short,’ she thought, panting and pulling herself upright.

The warm, fuzzy feeling from before, the one that let her think, was starting to recede as pain once again grew more insistent.

The eye and connecting tissue came out with her heel when she finally raised herself on her right leg, but her spare time in the Devildom, as slow as it was around her now, was spent. The deceased’s partner was already there, each purple-gray scale easily visible. ‘I’ll probably die with them under my nails,’ she thought.

It was no longer towering, its jaws already at throat level. There was nothing left to do, no way to get out of range. Maybe today would be the day she’d rely on Satan completely after all. Would he be proud that she didn’t give up until the end?

‘I hope he won’t be sad for too long,’ she thought, raising her hand. ‘ I just wish I knew how this worked.’

Her left hand crashed into its nose, narrowly avoiding teeth, skimming up and landing on its eyes.The flash of green made ash under her palm. Its charred face stared lidlessly back at her.

‘Am I dead?’ she wondered, retracting her arm to look at her palm. ‘There’s no sound. No music.’ The silence stretched out around her.

The beast didn’t continue forward or fall, furthering her confusion. She knew she wasn’t strong enough to halt it.

Blood began fountaining out from under its head. ‘It’s not my blood?’ she wondered. That didn’t make sense. She looked down at her body, covered in its own layer of blood and guts.

‘Shouldn’t I be bleeding?’ she thought, looking at her left hand in confusion. For a moment, that was all she could focus on; she wasn’t even sure she was breathing.

Finally, all of the sounds, and smells, and forces started to fit together into reason. A gloved hand had ripped out her attacker’s throat. She watched as the burnt upper half of its face crumbled away when the throat and attached jaw fell to the ground. Her gaze followed the hand that had actually stopped her pursurer’s charge.

Lucifer. In that moment, he was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. It was a mild euphoria that made her want to relax everything and fall at his feet. ‘Is this what this type of dying feels like?’ she wondered. ‘It’s not as frightening as last time.’

‘His overcoat is missing,’ she thought, trying to pull herself together. She blinked stupidly at him. ‘He didn’t even have to transform.’

She looked around. Everyone was staring, the lights had stopped, and the DJ was unmoving. Not good.

‘Making a scene is only good to bring help,’ she thought sluggishly. The static was quickly returning to fog her mind. ‘Nothing can help me if I embarrass Lucifer. Would this embarrass him?’

The right side of her body and more was covered in gore, and her left leg was steeped in brains and blood. She pointed at the DJ, high above them all, and motioned for him to ‘raise it’. Its beaked mouth fell open in what she hoped was surprise. She looked back at Lucifer, uncertain where to go from there with two corpses at her feet.

‘Fuck that hurt,’ she thought, lowering her arms.

He’d followed her gaze and signalled, with a painfully aristocratic wave of his clean hand, for the DJ to continue. Its tentacles began to move rapidly, restarting the magic of the hovering orbs that produced sound and lights. The beat returned without a hint of somberness.

‘Demons are so strange,’ she thought. A chill was starting to envelope her and the tingling returned to her hands and feet.

It was confusing that no one was fleeing the dance floor. If anything, more demons arrived. Nothing had changed except that the floor was slick and smoke rose from the charred face next to her in addition to the smoke machines.

She took the gloved hand Lucifer offered to her, as bloody as she was. At least he wasn’t saying anything about her appearance. Not that she’d managed to meet his eyes yet.

It didn’t matter. All she wanted was to fall against him. She’d never been happier to see him.

“Are you all right?” he asked as he pulled her in to dance with him, ridged and upright, completely opposite what the music called for.

‘Thank the spirits above and below.’ She rested some of her weight on him to relieve her leg as he led her to dance on their corpses. His foot crushed the skull of the one she’d singed, but she couldn’t bring herself to grimace; she was too focused on staying upright.

He’d pressed her bloody cheek to his. She might as well have been hanging there in his arms for how much of her weight he took.

“I’m injured,” she said, and felt him stiffen. “Stop whatever it is you’re about to do and keep dancing,” she ordered him as he began to pull away.

The look Lucifer gave her morphed from concern into a scowl, but he waited.

“Everyone already thinks I’m weak, but that doesn’t mean you should prove them right and remove all doubt,” she said, anger and pride ready to overload her. It was really all she had left, just the fumes of emotions to fuel her. “Let me walk out under my own power. I’m already an embarrassment enough to your brothers. Please don’t add more.”

She didn’t have the energy left to fight him on this. Could he tell she was about to cry?

He didn’t bother to address her words, only returned to their cozy embrace. “What did you think you were doing? Where is Mammon? Asmodeus?” His words were sharp and he felt her try to shift away as they landed.

“I’m not sure where they are.”

“You could have died!” His accusation was the crack of a whip and she winced openly, unable to hold him tighter and hide against him.

‘Is he blaming me?’ she began to wonder, what was left of her thoughts beginning to sizzle. ‘After all of the effort, all of the pain and terror I’ve been through, is he dismissing that?’

Eye to eye, it was her turn to lean away as she appraised him. No black remained in Lucifer’s eyes, only the burning red met her gaze.

“I am well aware I could have died,” she said, lowly, now uncomfortably alert. Did he know the human saying that was playing through her head over and over? “But I came into this world kicking and screaming, covered in someone else's blood, and I have no problem with going out the same way if necessary.”

His expression only hardened further. That had not been what he was expecting her to say. Then again, he hadn’t expected her to be covered in demon entrails either. He’d expected to find her wrapped deliciously in paint and what amounted to a candy wrapper worth of cloth. It wasn’t what he’d wanted to find, or what he wanted her to say.

‘Hadn’t she been about to break a moment ago? When did that turn to angry grit?’ he wondered, shielding his concern from the outside world with an uninterested expression. Just a sworn lord of Diavolo checking on the well-being of the exchange program, filth under his feet where they belonged.

“Stop moving,” he said instead of asking further questions. He brought her back to his embrace once again. It was obvious to him that she couldn’t hold herself up. He’d seen her struggle to rise just before the last attack.

He felt her upper body relax against him and a small breath at his ear. ‘Is she laughing?’

“The night’s not over yet,” she said. The warm memory of his bossy orders while he slept with his arms around her slipped away as she focused on immediate need. ‘Information. He needs information,’ she remembered, ‘I can’t fall asleep here. Not yet.’

“There’s still one left,” she told him, trying to mask the pain in her voice. “They all seem to be related to one another. I think the last one left for the toilets while the other two guarded the door, but it could be gone by now.”

She continued to scan the swelling crowd around them. The muscle in his jaw was flexing against her cheek, and she knew he was thinking nothing good.

”I can take you with me to find them if you can stay out of harm's way.”

Her strained breathing was becoming obvious and it took her time to formulate a response. “I can’t move well enough to stay out of the way,” she told him truthfully.

It was impossible to muster up shame for her admission. She’d done well for what she was equipped with. This was out of her league. “We need Mammon,” she said, and gasped.

She must’ve turned the wrong way and shocked her hip socket again because her whole body jolted and she stumbled. Breath knocked out of her, eyes wide, she drew in a stuttered breath.

Lucifer, mercifully, held her steady until she regained herself.

‘Just a little longer,’ she told herself, ‘then I can sleep.’ All of the warmth was almost gone. She could barely feel the heat from his body against hers.

She looked around. Did anyone see her stumble? It wouldn’t do to be advertising herself as bait when Lucifer would need to leave her somewhere to find her last abductor. Looking everywhere else, she was oblivious to his concern.

The music was still playing as she continued to straighten herself slowly, greedily taking in air. Was it warm in here? She couldn’t seem to tell the difference between hot and cold anymore. Every movement felt like burning.

Bright white next to her drew her attention. His demonic form on display, Mammon was at her elbow. ‘It’s strange to be almost the same height,’ she thought. He reached for her as if he were about to cut in on their dance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On a more serious note, if anyone does ever try to nab you please PLEASE make a scene no matter what.
> 
> It's been over ten years, but its still seared into my memory, of a young woman being dragged down Prince Arthur St-W by her hair on a Friday night. She screamed and screamed and at first - for the first fifteen minutes even - I dismissed the noise as just more drunken partiers in downtown Montreal. It wasn't, he was loudly yelling like he was drunk over her every time she got too loud. He would shake her into silence when he couldn't be louder than her. But I heard her. And I called the police when I spied them from my apartment balcony on my 16th floor. Never ever give up. 
> 
> The police were on their way immediately.
> 
> PLEASE ALWAYS MAKE A SCENE. Even if it feels like its been forever and no one hears you. Don't give up.


	67. Hector

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon tries to escort MC home from The Fall.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again Dalektable was my champion. Without their help and advice with this chapter would have crashed and burned.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_The music was still playing as she continued to straighten herself slowly, greedily taking in air. Was it warm in here? She couldn’t seem to tell the difference between hot and cold anymore. Every movement felt like burning._

_Bright white next to her drew her attention. His demonic form on display, Mammon was at her elbow. ‘It’s strange to be almost the same height,’ she thought. He reached for her as if he were about to cut in on their dance._

With Mammon’s help, she stepped off the headless corpse. As the shoes adjusted to her needs, the eyeball impaled on her heel squeaked and burst uncomfortably, its lense shooting out only to strike her other ankle.

“Take me to the cloak room?” she asked.“I need to slowly stretch my legs.”

Without looking, she knew that Lucifer was already gone, and she didn’t turn to say goodbye. He’d melted into the flashing lights and disorienting noise.

“Like hell I will! We’re taking you home right now,” he said, while she adjusted his arm for support.

The way the skin at the corners of his eyes didn’t relax and how his mouth was tensed but just barely quivering, it made his panic obvious to her. To anyone else he would just seem unsmiling, but she knew he was even more alarmed than Lucifer was to find her covered in gore.

Even now, he wasn't tugging her along or storming out with her in his arms. He was waiting, uncertain.

‘Does she know there are tear tracks down her bloodied face? How is she standing?’ was all he could think. ‘Where was she? I don’t know how injured she is...can I safely lift her?’ His thoughts continued to swirl until she crooked her finger, beckoning him to bend his ear to her. Words only for him as she stiffly brought her other hand up to cup around her mouth.

“I don’t want to stretch my legs. I hurt everywhere, Mammon, but I won’t let anyone here know I am any more injured than they can guess at. Don’t chum the water for the sharks. Now, walk me to the cloak room so that I can tear Hector to pieces.”

She knew she didn’t sound right. There was no playfulness in her voice, no seriousness, just flat information. It hurt her heart to see the way he looked at her, but reassurances would have to wait. Right now, appearances were more important. He straightened and didn’t mention how heavily she leaned on him as he acted as her crutch, smoothing out their gait.

Maybe she shouldn’t have told him until they got closer; his wings were already twitching in agitation. The front desk was empty of personnel and Mammon side-eyed her when she didn’t pause, but kept them walking towards the splintered door behind it, swinging her injured leg as carefully and guilefully as possible.

She held onto the door frame, releasing his arm. “Capture Hector.”

It hadn’t been a command, but his body responded as if it had been. Anything to bring back some inflection to her voice. He’d bring her Hector’s head if she asked. If she hadn’t said capture, he might’ve anyway.

Mammon stepped past her only to pause, lost for words at the sight before him. Flesh and blood spray covered one wall, pools of blood like stepping stones across the room, a body hidden poorly behind a couch, and Hector. ‘She had been in here. They had exposed her to this?’

The weight of Mammon’s anger stole the breath from her lungs, whipping around him the way Satan’s storm had cloaked her. She could feel the Devildom focusing down to a pinpoint, centered around them, tinted in yellows and black. If not for the doorframe, she would have fallen into the black hole that was Mammon. Hector had collapsed onto the carpet, crushed under the weight, and Mammon hadn’t even touched him yet.

She struggled to bring air back into her lungs. “ALIVE, PLEASE!” she shouted into the maelstrom. Had he heard her? Her voice felt so weak now.

It was different from Satan’s power: brighter, brasher, and more dangerous. As the pressure began to lift it became easier to breathe. He had heard her after all.

Stepping inside, she shuffled and hopped her way along the wall to the couch, barely smearing her old handiwork along the way.

A creaking noise drew her attention; Mammon’s boot was slowly pressing into Hector’s chest. A corresponding ache sprang up over her own breastbone. She reached to touch her chest but stopped, unprepared to explore the damage.

Clearing the cushion furthest from them of bone shards, she gingerly leaned herself into a seat to catch her breath. ‘I wish the warm fuzziness would return’ she thought. Instead she only felt the prickling of cold sweat and the way her head swam.

“I still need my purse, Hector” she said, as if he weren’t currently under the pressure of a garbage compactor. Her voice had been barely above a whisper.

‘Need to conserve energy,’ she reminded herself. Fear prickled at the backs of her knees and lumbar, connecting the two.

“You heard the lady,” Mammon growled. She pushed down the shiver that arose from the intensity in his threat. Each word was dyed with his need to pull Hector apart. Slowly.

Hector gurgled but pointed to the couch, a couple feet to her side.

Her expression must’ve been sour because Mammon pressed harder and she heard cracking before she watched him startle and lift his leg away. ‘Had he not meant to do that?’ she wondered. ‘Does my opinion change his reactions so drastically?’ Maybe it was a part of the pact or maybe it was just Mammon. She didn’t know.

A concussive blast bounced Hector’s body off the floor. She hadn’t even seen Mammon remove his foot. ‘Did I blank out?’ It was a strange sensation to feel so impressed when she was barely able to breathe. Usually it felt like an expansion of awe in her chest; instead it felt like it was outside her, no longer a part of her. Nothing here felt real anymore.

She could tell from her seat that Mammon had broken something in Hector’s face. The skin around his eyes darkened quickly. She should feel some sort of justice, a bruise for a bruise, but she couldn’t bring herself to care right now. Watching Hector go slack gave her nothing. It felt like watching a frightening movie without sound.

“Check under the couch for me?” she asked him when she knew their captive was dead to the world. “I can’t.”

He had to help her up before he lifted the couch. The lungless demon was only two feet from her purse.

‘No wonder I couldn’t find it,’ she thought, trying not to laugh at the stupidity of it all. It was something Asmo had purchased, and it easily stood out anywhere.

Mammon hadn’t expected her to move closer to the corpse, but there she was, trying to collect her purse on her own, shaking as she tried to retrieve it.

‘I deserve her lack of reliance,’ he thought, gritting his teeth. ‘I left her to this after all. How could she expect me to do anything smaller.’ He knelt and collected it for her.

“I’m sure Lucifer will want to talk with Hector,” she said. He couldn’t interpret her mood at all. “Would you bring me a coat tag and pen?”

He had them for her before she could turn her head, holding it out to her, even as she was still shrugging on her purse strap. The intense need for redemption kept him on egg shells, needing to do her bidding. Handing them over, he watched her write: The pen was only jostled once by a sliver of bone embedded in the wall behind it, but her hands were still steady.

‘If she can be steady then so can I,’ he thought. ‘I need to be steady, so that she can relax.’ She hadn’t been able to bend to grab her purse. The worry started to claw at him again. ‘Her stubbornness is becoming too much. I need to get her home.’

“Pin this on him, would you?” she asked, interrupting his contemplations. ‘Accomplice’ it read, speckled with blood from the wall where she’d held the tag.

He pinned it through the bridge of the broken nose, before winding energy around the collapsed body. Hector wouldn’t be going anywhere soon.

Even in her current state, she likely would have grimaced seeing that, or she hoped she would have, but she was too busy. There in the gaping cavity of the demon’s chest were the two pieces of her dress. Inspecting herself, she found that the gaps had filled in with an intricate lace, not unlike the original fabric, but the design was no longer the same. The image of long feathers, curling over like bent grass in a breeze, had threaded itself over the holes. The mirrored patches filled the segregated heart over her stomach. 'Is it the patches burning or me?' she wondered.

She motioned for Mammon to collect the old fabric out of the blast site, shushing him when he started to ask why. He drew them out through the jagged ribs like tissue paper, and she stuffed them in her pocket, coagulated blood and all.

“Let’s go home,” she said, sluggishly lifting her hand, reaching for him.

“Just a little further,” he heard her almost singing under her breath, and Mammon had to purposefully hold himself back from carrying her away. ‘If Lucifer hadn’t scooped her up then there was a reason. There had to be a reason. At least she reached for me first this time.’

Finally outside, he was too focused on her to even notice Diavolo and Barbatos approaching.

“Lord Diavolo. Barbatos!” she said, her smile wide again and the sparkle almost returned to her eyes. But her voice was so quiet.

“Is everything all right, Miss?” Barbatos asked, but Diavolo had already begun moving closer, about to clasp her shoulders in his hands.

Mammon didn’t know when it happened, but he had released her arm to wrap her in his instead, hovering gently around her. His other arm extended, palm nearly touching Diavolo’s chest, warding him away. ‘Maybe I’m the one with the death wish afterall,' he thought.

“Just a night out,” she said amicably, focused on Diavolo, and ignoring the arm lingering around her.

Mammon thought he was going to explode, wrapped around her, needing to escape. ‘What is she doing? There’s no point in lying, they can both see right through you!’ he wanted to shout.

“I’m sorry we won’t get to dance tonight,” she said, pushing a strand of bloodied hair away from her cheek as flirtily as if she’d just arrived at the doors as well. “Unfortunately, this human is all tuckered out.” She tilted her head to the side to include Barbatos in the discussion again. “I’m sure Lucifer will fill you in on the festivities. Please enjoy your evening.”

And with that, she unwrapped Mammon like a stole. He tried his best to bow his head slightly before escorting her around the corner of the building.

As soon as they were out of sight her legs buckled.

“Hey, hey, you’re not allowed to–I was lookin’ everywhere for you!” he tried to whisper his shout to her as he lifted her under the arms. He couldn’t afford to draw more attention to them.

“Oh man, this is bad!” he said. They couldn’t stay here any longer, but she was looking around in her purse for something. Her D.D.D..

He could see her skin had lost colour and the panic started to claw up his chest into his throat again.

“Satan. Come home. Bring any healing potions you can find.” _Click_. She hadn’t waited for his response.

Mammon took the D.D.D. from her hand. She seemed to have forgotten she was even holding it.

“Take me home?” she asked, her eyes closing sleepily.

He didn’t bother to answer her. Gathering her in his arms, he didn’t stop when she let out low, pained groans. Carefully, he kicked off the ground, trying his best to soften the sharp moment between when gravity would try to pull them back down and his wings would strain and catch them. The less he jostled her the better.

Flying low over the buildings with her, he took slow, deep breaths. ‘Always use the terrain as cover,’ he heard the memory of Lucifer’s voice from years past.

They needed to retreat quickly, but too fast or high up and it would freeze or injure her, which meant using the buildings as sight blinds. He swallowed hard. She already felt too cold in his grasp. ‘What were you doing? How did they separate you from Asmo so quickly?’

Out of sight, first. That was all that mattered. If anyone knocked them out of the sky, she wouldn’t survive. He couldn’t gamble his ability to dodge against her life. His heart was racing. ‘If only I could move as fast as my heart right now,” he thought.

“Hey you, stay awake!”

“Imma wake,” she said, only slurring her words slightly.

“What happened in there?” he asked. She needed to keep talking. She needed to stay awake. His wings stuttered in their flight and they dropped several feet. She needed to keep him focused.

“Angry goatsnakes don’t like Diavolo,” she said, as if that explained everything.

Trees were whipping past them. They were in the park, she recognized. Or was it the forest by the house? “Mammon?” But nothing else came from her. He peeked down at her to see her eyes had closed.

“No, no, no, you can't close your eyes right now! Talk to me more,” he said, trying to keep it together. He needed to concentrate, fast but not too fast.

“I think I broke my ankle too.”

“Why were you dancing on it then–no, wait, what do you mean too?”

“It’s okay,” she reassured him, but she sounded far away. “I hope it’s broken. Bone heals a lot faster than the soft squishy bits.”

‘You are all soft squishy bits!’ he thought.

“Still can't get over your bad-ass vibe,” she said, smiling stupidly at him, “but you're actually silly and adorable as fuck.”

“I am not adorable,” he said as he swept them between more buildings and avoided the light of the streets. ‘If we’d stayed home tonight and you’d said that I would have growled until you laughed at me.’ He swallowed his thoughts down. This was his fault.

“What? You're still **Mammon** , **Crusher of Enemies** ,” she said, slipping her cold hand under the edge of his jacket, leeching heat from him. “You're just cute as fuck while doing it.” She laughed but it ended in a groan as she clutched at her stomach.

“I will smite anyone for you in the future, but it won’t be cute,” he said, the wind tearing some of his voice away. ‘Please let me smite everyone for you in the future. Please let there be more future.’

She smiled. "Beautiful and terrible then."

Her words went by unprocessed by him. She was delirious. All he wanted was to tell her he'd keep her closer. Would she want that after he’d failed her so spectacularly? Maybe she’d rather one of his brothers be assigned to care for her after this. If she survived this. ‘Is any of that blood hers?’ he wondered, his breathing becoming shaky with emotion.

“You’re getting pretty cold,” he said. The hope in his gut clenched,, waiting for her to reassure him that she was fine.

“Yeah, but I’d rather be cold with you than warm by myself,” she said, her words almost too quiet for him to hear over the air around them.

“Don’t be stupid,” he said. That wasn’t what he wanted to hear at all, even if it did make his heart warm.

“But it’s true; I'd rather have all the bad times with you than good times with someone else.” Her eyes started to close again.

Were her lips going blue or was that just the bad lighting? His breaths were coming rapidly. It felt like he’d flown too high, up to where the air was thin, and he had to actively slow each breath to keep his hands and feet from tingling any worse. If he didn’t, he’d drop her.

She was quiet and something welled in him beyond worry. It wasn’t dread, but something hotter. It was the sort of bone deep emotion that made him want to hold her tighter with one hand and draw a sword against the world with the other. He would tear the Devildom apart to find who had done this. It would make Belphegor’s revenge look like a gentle scolding.

There was a cold pat on his cheek. Her eyes were still closed. “I hope Satan makes it home soon.”

Tears began to blur his vision. The memory of her hand doing just that when she’d died before overwhelmed him. ‘I will carry her until I have to bury her,’ he thought, willing The House of Lamentation closer to them.

He wouldn’t give up until that point, not until he’d done everything in his power.


	68. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon finally gets MC home but she's far more injured than he realized.
> 
> Day 46, Wednesday, February 15th => Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again Dalektable was my champion. Without their help and advice with this chapter would have crashed and burned.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_There was a cold pat on his cheek. Her eyes were still closed. “I hope Satan makes it home soon.”_

_Tears began to blur his vision. The memory of her hand doing just that when she’d died before overwhelmed him. ‘I will carry her until I have to bury her,’ he thought, willing The House of Lamentation closer to them._

_He wouldn’t give up until that point, not until he’d done everything in his power._

A rush of light enveloped her, blinding her to her surroundings. Mammon was moving too fast. The colours here were reassuring, familiar even if she couldn’t make out why.

Eventually the lights became recognizable and she realized they had come to a stop: her room. They were home. A strange sense of calm swept through her.

“The floor,” she whispered. She wanted to be flat and when he set her down, she did her best not to cry. ‘Yep, definitely hurts more now.’

Mammon came back with ice and set it on her ankle. ‘He’s always so sweet when he thinks I won’t remember it,’ she thought, watching in a stupor as he tried to put a pillow under her foot. An explosion of pain hit her, which she muffled behind a clenched jaw and pinched lips, but the whine that escape had him lowering her leg again quickly. His movements were jerky and rapid, like an anxious pinball, as he tried to find something to help her.

“Might’ve broken something else,” she said, breathing as shallowly as she could. Instead of trying to accommodate her leg, a comforter from her bed was draped over her instead. “Thanks.” There was no warmth under it, but it was calming nonetheless.

Belphegor peeked in, following after Mammon’s shouts for help.

She didn’t know if he’d already been transformed, or if it was just out of shock, but he was at her side in an instant. Fading into unconsciousness, his words were soundless above her. He hadn’t even touched her.

It took most of Belphegor’s strength to keep Mammon from laying his hands on her. “She’s just asleep. She’s just asleep,” he promised until Mammon stopped pushing forward. They both looked at her.

“How bad is it?” he asked, only able to see her face and feet. That by itself didn’t look promising.

The haggard and pitiful expression that Mammon answered him with was answer enough.

“As much as I hate to say it,” Belphegor said, “Beel would be…helpful.”

Crouched now at her side, Mammon looked up at him. “Look, I know you and her have only just started getting along but…I–” he ran a shaky hand through his hair. “She’s special and I know she already–” He swallowed. “But…” His voice cracked with emotion as he tried to force out the words.

Belphegor understood what he was trying to say. ‘It doesn’t matter, Beel will be here soon enough with how sick I must’ve made him feel just now,’ he thought. He wanted to look away from her blood stained face but he couldn’t stop himself from staring.

“Don’t stay,” he told Mammon, lifting his phone to type directions. “I’ll keep things in check.”

Dejection painted every line of Mammon’s body as he set his hand on Belphegor’s shoulder. “Thanks,” Mammon said before moving past him and out the door.

He knew he shouldn't leave, but he just couldn’t stay there and watch Beelzebub touch her.

‘I will rend them limb from limb!’ he thought, storming through the halls, ‘but I can’t.’ Every part of him wanted to hunt them down. If this was the beginning of his penance then it was a fitting way to punish him for his transgression. History was repeating itself and he was powerless to stop it. He liked to think it was only an echo of losing Lilith, but this tore apart his insides with the same intensity, in a way that the past didn’t hurt anymore. There was no numbness in this.

‘I have to wait for word from Lucifer,’ he reminded himself. ‘I won’t leave her unprotected again.’

* * *

The guilt was a heavy snake in Belphegor’s stomach as he watched Mammon leave, but soon enough, Beelzebub skidded around the corner, nearly taking out part of the door frame as he ran to them.

“She’s just asleep,” Belphegor said, watching Beelzebub’s sharp, quick movements as he made his way to her side.

“Doesn’t look good,” his brother said, kneeling down to look at her skin colour on the cleanest side of her face. He was wringing his hands as though he wanted to pull them off before he ran his hands over her head, searching for any obvious contusions or breaks. A sigh of relief left him. ‘At least there’s nothing wrong here.’

“Help me take her shoes off,” he said, eyeing the continued swelling of her ankle. They were efficient, even when she stirred briefly in pain.

Beelzebub didn’t want to remove her source of heat, but he needed to check the extent of the damage. ‘Mammon wouldn’t put her on the floor and run away if it weren’t bad.’ Dread owned him in that moment before he lifted the veil; its iciness filled the pit of his stomach and locked his teeth together.

Peeling away the blanket, he swallowed harshly, taking in the unnatural set of her leg and the different bits of pinks and purple-grey scales pasted onto her with coagulated blood. Her breathing was shallow, her heartbeat faint.

Gently, he assessed the damaged leg. Only two major areas of concern. “Dislocated,” he said aloud, stalling Belphegor’s pacing. “Maybe broken talus.” He was sure Belphegor’s stomach was as painfully clenched as his was right now.

The femur could be put back into the socket without much issue, he was fairly sure, but depending on what she’d broken, it might take fifteen minutes or it might take an hour to keep it from popping back out in the future. ‘What happened to put her in this state? There’s no one faster. What could get to her before Mammon could?’

Beelzebub pressed his hands against the leg that lay normally, working his way up. Nothing but overuse that he could tell. He heard Belphegor’s muttered cursing as he paced nearby, feeling their shared turmoil. Fire licked at the insides of his mind; it was Belphegor, demanding retribution, the only thing that saved him from freezing up entirely.

His hands rose higher, and she groaned. Belphegor crouched across from him without a word.  
“Just cartilage damage,” Beelzebub muttered, but he was concerned as his hand brushed against a hardened area just above her hip bone. He inhaled loudly, but said nothing, lightly pressing his fingers to her abdomen before he alarmed his twin further. He felt Belphegor’s gaze burning into him all the same; it was impossible to keep all of his fear locked away.

Even in unconsciousness, the pressure had her shying away, and she let out a low keening noise as she tried to escape the gentle fingertips. Belphegor placed his hand in hers and dragged her deeper down into oblivion.

“Belphie, we need to get this off her. It’s really bad.”

“Can’t you just–”

“It has some sort of chastity magic imbued in it. I don’t have time to guess at what’s being covered!” he said. “We need to be faster.”

Belphegor slid a shaking claw down the length of the dress, unused to Beelzebub demanding and ordering outside of war zones. The fear reflected back at him should only exist in Beelzebub’s nightmares. ‘This isn’t a combat area, nor is it one of Beel’s memories on repeat: these orders shouldn’t exist here. This can’t be happening.’ He tried to keep the tremor from his cutting hand.

“Fuck,” he said. “The fabric still just seals back up.” There was very little that wouldn’t yield to his claws, and he looked at Beelzebub, conveying further uneasiness. If he put any actual power behind his efforts it would tear away more than just her dress.

“That’s not possible,” Beelzebub said, his hand on her naked shoulder, trying to concentrate healing as best he could from so far away from the wound. “Even this type of fabric can’t have withstood the amount of damage needed to do this to her and still ward you off.”

He hovered his other hand over her stomach, willing his power into the general direction. Anything to stop the bleeding. “I need to focus over the wound, but it’s dampened by the magic in the cloth.” Impotent rage threatened to reveal his true form, but he knew it would do nothing.

‘Of all the times, Asmodeus…’ he thought, cursing him. His only hope to save her was being destroyed by a scrap of cloth smaller than one of his shirts. ‘What is the key to removing this? It could be set to open to any thought, any emotion!’

Belphegor pulled out his D.D.D. and dialed Asmodeus, listening and waiting for an answer. He redialed and kept redialing. An unusual hint of colour caught his eye and he set the D.D.D. down. He brought his hand next to Beelzebub’s, to very, very carefully look at the new motif that had not been under his hands after dinner. The fabric definitely lay differently than he remembered. “Shit. She must’ve done it again. It would explain why the dress isn’t already frayed or falling apart.”

Beelzebub’s hands moved away, strenuously waiting for Belphegor’s explanation.

He pointed to the faint patches. “The colour isn’t a perfect match on these,” he said. “They’re an appliqué with flecks of red in the black and it feels just like Lucifer’s magic. She must’ve touched him when all of this was happening, or maybe after?” Thoroughly, Belphegor searched the dress for any other hint of magic. “There’s nothing here of Mammon or Asmodeus.”

‘What the fuck happened that neither Asmodeus nor Mammon where there for her and she had to search out Lucifer?’ Belphegore wondered.

Their eyes met. “It’s possible she might know the key. Bring her out,” Beelzebub said.

Nearby, she could feel Belphegor calling to her while she floated, and then the bright glow lights on her ceiling slowly came in to focus. She felt only aching, a deep, continuous pain that lived at the base of her spine and wouldn’t let her float away. “Is Satan back yet?” she asked, but neither of them answered her right away, uncertain if she even knew when or where they were.

“Not yet, Princess,” Belphegor told her, keeping his expression neutral.

“That’s not goOD,” she said before falling back from her attempt to sit up. “He’s supposed to bring potions...” Beelzebub’s hand stopped her from dropping her head straight back to the rug.

The glance between them only confused her. “What’s the word, doctors?” she asked, trying to bring them into focus.

“We need to get your dress off,” Beelzebub said without a trace of embarrassment.

“Quickly,” Belphegor said.

“You can’t just–” she started, flexing a finger for explanation.

“No, we can’t,” Belphegor said. “Magic issue.”

“Oh. OH,” she said. “If you can’t get it off, I’m not sure I’ll be able to either. The other demon managed to cut it, though...”

Belphegor resisted the urge to press his hands over his face. She didn’t understand the urgency of the situation, still glassy-eyed and staring. ‘I’m going to murder Mammon first,’ he thought, using it to defusesome of his frustration.

She could feel her emotions shifting between warm, cuddly sleep into the coldness of being tearfully overwrought. ‘This needs to be fast before I’m just a crying, useless mess.’

“Well, only one way to find out if this’ll work twice,” she said, her voice forcibly chipper even to her own ear. “Claws, please~” She lifted Belphegor’s hand, already in her own.

He did as directed without a word, alarmed by her cheerfulness and disregard for her current state. ‘Does she not realize how hurt she is?’

Guiding a claw to her chest, she told him “Only think chaste, sweet thoughts,” before she pressed the claw tip into the edge of the fabric.

Beelzebub had never considered that Asmodeus would leave the combination as the pre-set. ‘Why would he give her something he couldn’t get into?’

When he drew blood, Belphegor startled, but she didn’t let go of his hand. “Don’t panic,” she said softly when she saw his distress. “I can’t feel it. Just focus...”

He felt her dipping in and out of consciousness without him to hold her to wakefulness. Her eyes constantly fought to stay open and his consciousness slid against her fluctuating mind. A small smile started to spread across his face despite the lapping waves of impatient fear from Beelzebub. The sensation of the dream he’d shared with her, full of sunshine and warm blades of grass under his feet, tickled at the edges of his consciousness while he continued to cut through the dress.

Beelzebub lifted her quickly once the last seam had snapped, yanking the fabric away from her and tossing it aside. He wanted to be thankful that she didn’t wake, but it remained to be seen whether that was a blessing or a curse.

Beside them, the threads were already trying to reorganize, metallic reds and blacks knitting themselves together, but it was the three swollen bruises, oval-shaped and ringed in dead blood, that held their attention instead. From the swelling and the shape it was obvious the damage went deep. Above, an equally concerning dark shadow spread out from her sternum across her chest.

Both of Beelzebub’s hands went to her belly, completely immersed in his work, even when she tried to move away from him. ‘The burning of healing can be painful, especially at this slow rate.’ He’d have to trust Belphegor to keep her sedated and cursed himself for letting his strength lie fallow. He’d allowed this skill to atrophy and now it might cost her her life.

“Come on now. Back to sleep,” he heard Belphegor say when she tried to move away from the pain.

It was so much harder to heal her when he couldn’t be touching all of her, but lifting her again to lay her on him would be too much for her. ‘Once I’ve got the bleeding under control, I can move her.’ He shook away the thoughts better saved for the future. ‘Focusing on now is the most important thing, anything else is meaningless at this point.’

When Satan opened the door, Beelzebub didn’t notice. It was Belphegor who motioned him over, seeing the trove of red potions in his hands. He made space for him at her side.

Unstopping one of the corks, Satan leaned across Belphegor to bring it to her lips.

“Stop,” Beelzebub said, his word unquestionable here. “Pour it on her.”

Together, they stared at him before Satan jerked out of his bewilderment and followed the order. They watched it soak into her skin, steaming, and poured another when Beelzebub removed his hands and sat back. He wasn’t weakened, but the sweat on his brow and the rate of his breathing attested to the work he’d done.

“I thought it was a bruise,” Belphegor said. Guilt and awe tugged at him as the deep shadow that had spread out and under her bra slowly disappeared; her indented chest creaked and rose to the correct shape, bringing with it a sharp and ragged gasp. He picked tiny slivers of bone from her arm to help it heal faster, to keep him from breaking as he watched her become unbroken.

“How was she able to call me like this?” Satan asked, reaching for her hand. His face was ashen. “Potions are only ever poured out when the internal damage is bad enough that magic won’t flow correctly,” he said to Beel, hoping to be corrected, but he was ignored.

The surge of anger he felt spread outward, swelling and growing in intensity. It stopped short of the tips of his fingers, reigning it back inward as quickly as he could. His magic would only undo what work had been done. ‘What did this?’ he thought, trying to distract himself and search her for clues. Scales, deflated lung sacs, and other viscera clung to her. A small chunk of eyeball was still stuck to the underside of a discarded shoe.

Belphegor could see the cogs turning as Satan’s eyes flickered from place to place. He shifted his contact with her from her hand to her shoulder, and immediately Satan searched both of her hands. ‘Uncertainty could unhinge him.’ Belphegor observed him warily. ‘We have to be careful.’

“My glyphs are gone. They should’ve been enough to protect her.”

“Keep pouring them,” Beelzebub said, still not looking up at them as he moved back to take a short break.

“What are you talking about?” Belphegor asked Satan, uncorking a bottle with his teeth and spitting it past him.

“Before she left, I poured blood magic into her hands,” he said, staring at her face. “But they’re gone. She must’ve used them but she still looks like–like this.” He doused her in two more.

Belphegor looked at Satan carefully. It was rare to see him out of his depth. It made him unpredictable. It made him unsafe for her to be around. He tried to still the way his tail flicked warily behind him at the new threat. ‘I’ll carry him out of here if I have to but he can’t stay here with her.’

“Satan, bring me food. Belphegor, keep pouring until you have only one left. Wake her enough to drink that last one.” He breathed harshly between orders. He could feel Belphegor itching for a fight. Now was not the time.

“I’ll fix her leg after,” he said, motioning to her before he leaned back against her bed. He couldn’t tell if the pain in his stomach was from them seeing her broken body, or from the extra acid that churned in him, demanding sustenance. ‘What happened? Why did Mammon bring you home like this?’ He wanted to pull at his hair in frustration. ‘If Satan hadn’t come…my ability just isn’t enough.’ He wouldn’t cry. ‘Tears are for after, never during a crisis.’ He concentrated on breathing instead. There’d been no reason for him to heal others for centuries; all of his brothers healed quickly or were strong enough to avoid injury. A strong wave of grief washed over him. He was enfeebled.

They snapped to their duties without question and Beelzebub continued to hold himself away from her. Not touching her felt reprehensible, but he knew if he took her hand he’d only continue working, feeding energy to her. The potions needed more time to work their magic. ‘A short rest is necessary’ he reminded himself. It meant he’d be able to concentrate properly when the worst of the broken networks were patched enough to transport his meager remediation again.

It felt like no time had passed before he heard her voice again and his head shot up to see Belphegor helping her drain the last potion. ‘Did I space out over the course of nine different pours?’ he wondered, shaking his head to bring himself back to the moment before him.

“I bet Simeon never has to pull gross body chunks off himself when he slays someone,” she said, batting aside the empty vial and peeling skin off of herself that was not her own. “I bet his white cape stays pristine. Lucky bastard.”

Beelzebub managed a wry smile. Even when she couldn’t bring herself to smile, she still found a way to give him the one she was missing.

“Yes, but his gloves are black,” Belphegor said. She rewarded him with a half-hearted laugh. He could only assume she was imagining the angel elbow deep in a devil or two.

“Humour for pain, never fails to dull the senses,” Satan said, joining them with a tray of food for Beelzebub. His relief was clear: his furrowed brow was smoothed out, his eyes lidded heavily, and a smile that showed teeth were offered to her as he circumvented her feet. Her voice did wonders to soothe the beast that was trying to claw its way out of him.

“I’m alive, so plenty of silver lining,” she said, hissing when she shifted the wrong way. ‘How long have I been home?’ she wondered. ‘Where’s Mammon?’

“N–g–ing u–,” Beelzebub said from somewhere behind her. His mouth was full of food, but his gaze remained unwavering over her form. ‘Vigilance is just as important now as ever,’ he thought. Her attempt to move was proof of that.

“He said don’t get up,” Belphegor translated, his hand on her shoulder ensuring she wouldn’t try again.

She wanted to sit up. She could feel the tears pooling in her eyes, distorting the view of her ceiling. ‘I don’t want to see through my own liquid weakness,’ she thought. ‘I don’t want to lay here where I argued with Mammon.’ The sluggishness she felt only made her feel more vulnerable.

“Where’s Mammon? Don’t let Lucifer hurt him. It wasn’t his fault.” she said, only for Belphegor to push more lethargy into her.

He pulled the comforter back over her body.

“Can’t sleep yet,” she yawned, fighting against the pull of Belphegor’s torpor, and trying to wriggle her hand free from his grasp. “Need to know…”

“Alright, one question and then sleep,” Belphegor said, his expression still stern. He was relieved when she turned away. He would have offered her anything her heart desired when that tear began to roll down the side of her face. Even if it was saving Mammon. Well, from Lucifer anyway.

Her gaze fell on Satan, still standing above them all. “What are the purple, goat-faced, snake-y demons called? They’re the worst.”

“You fought with a scale demon?” he asked. No wonder his glyphs hadn’t been enough. “With wings?” He moved his hands to mimic flying, surprise overcoming his usual deportment.

Beelzebub snatched the platter that had risen and fallen with Satan’s skepticism. ‘Ugh. Asmodeus’ hand waving is contagious at the worst times,’ he thought. He still listened intently.

“Killed,” she corrected sleepily. “No wings. They really hated Diavolo.” She rubbed absentmindedly at the fixed joints of her ribs, eyes leaking more as she yawned. “It feels so nice to breathe,” she said, luxuriating in the rise and fall of her diaphragm and the expansion of her ribs. “Thank you.”

“A lesser scale demon, then,” he said, eyebrows lost in his hairline. He’d begun to pace. “You managed to kill a lesser scale demon?”

“Three,” she hummed, dropping further away before starting awake again. “No, not three. Two and a half. Luci helped with the last one, but don’t tell him I gave him the credit.”

The other members of the Formerly Anti-Lucifer League looked at one another with amusement as her eyes closed.

‘Luci!’ Satan mouthed silently to his brothers. He didn’t think his shock could continue to grow.

She was going to be fine, eventually. None of them knew what to say next. They waited in silence while she dropped off into a deeper sleep without interruption.

“I’m going to go set up my bench to make potions,” Satan said after a time. “If Lucifer is still dealing with it, then this wasn’t an accident.” The air shifted menacingly around him.

Instantly, she frowned in her sleep, her hand unconsciously reaching for him; he left quickly and without another word.

* * *

**72 chat (2)**

**Belphie:** Beel says she’ll live. It was a close thing though.

 **Belphie:** Might not’ve if Satan hadn’t shown up with an apothecary’s worth of phials.

 **Mammoney:** Should I come see her?

 **Belphie:** Not any time soon. Just finished stopping the internal bleeding and reshaping her ribs.

 **Belphie:** Beel’s taking a food break. Hasn’t been able to put her leg back in its socket yet or deal with the breaks.

 **Mammoney:** But she’s gonna be okay?

 **Belphie:** …

 **Belphie:** It might take a while, but yeah, I think so.

 **Mammoney:** You think so?!

 **Belphie:** When does she ever do anything the normal way? Don’t ask me to guess at that.

 **Mammoney:** I can’t relax if ya make me wait for this long.

 **Belphie:** I’ll message you when it’s safe to come back.

 **Belphie:** If it makes you feel any better she already made fun of Lucifer.

 **Mammoney:** That’s my human!

 **Belphie:** We should talk after this.

 **Mammoney:** Hm? What's up?

 **Belphie:** You should update Levi first. Keep him out as well. Beel needs to concentrate.

* * *

Belphegor held back his words for Mammon. ‘Don’t touch her! Where were you? Where is Asmodeus? When do I get to use the two of you as immortal pinatas for letting her almost die?’ There would be time for that later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just wanted to let you know that I absolutely look forward to your comments. They don't have to be compliments (concrit is always welcome), but my absolute favourite thing to find in my inbox is when you all start speculating. Can't tell you how much fun it is to see this fiction from your perspective <3


	69. Waterlogged

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC wakes up groggy from healing and she's still covered in muck. Time to clean up. ;)
> 
> In the wee hours: Day 47, Thursday, February 16th
> 
> P.S. Hell has great geothermal heating, even when its cold out. There will never not be hot water.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again Dalektable was my champion. Without their help and advice with this chapter would have crashed and burned.<3  
> You can find their works here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dalektable/pseuds/Dalektable

_**Belphie:** If it makes you feel any better she already made fun of Lucifer._

_**Mammoney:** That’s my human!_

_**Belphie:** We should talk after this._

_**Mammoney:** Hm? What's up?_

_**Belphie:** You should update Levi first. Keep him out as well. Beel needs to concentrate._

* * *

_Belphegor held back his words for Mammon. ‘Don’t touch her! Where were you? Where is Asmodeus? When do I get to use the two of you as immortal pinatas for letting her almost die?’ There would be time for that later._

The sound of the shower drew Belphegor’s attention away from his D.D.D. and he tossed it onto the bed. The human sized burrito had disappeared from the floor and Beelzebub with it. He must’ve finished with her leg. They hadn’t even had to keep her asleep; putting the femur back in place had knocked her right out.

“Hurry up,” Beelzebub’s voice called into the main room.

“I thought you’d never ask,” Belphegor said, pulling off his sweater. “You know I love nothing more than to stand outside of showers in the cold watching.”

He stooped to untie his boots and kick them off. “What are you wearing?”

“Boxers,” Beel said, narrowing his eyes suspiciously. “It’s one of her rules for being in her room: clothing on.”

Belphegor continued to strip. “It’s one of her rules for **you** , maybe.”

“Just wake her up and then get in,” Beelzebub said, his annoyance growing exponentially. ‘I’m not going to start a fight over something so stupid. If she’s uncomfortable I’ll just kick him out… or knock him over the head.’ It wasn’t the first time the idea, and irony, of knocking out the Avatar of Sloth had made him smile.

“Up we go,” Belphegor said, lifting her as Beelzebub helped to unravel her from her bloodied cocoon.

He knew she was awake when he heard a small squeak of surprise at his shoulder. “Well, hello, Sleepyhead. Glad you could join us.”

Peeking around, she recognized her bathroom, and then a barely clad Beelzebub, one hand held shyly over his solar plexus while the other covered his wrist. ‘Why is he nervous? No, wait, why is he almost naked?’ she wondered.

Clearly, she had not kept her appreciative expression to herself because Belphegor spun her away and stepped into the warm spray with her still in his arms.

‘Good,’ he thought, ‘Now she actually has something to squeak and sputter about.’

“Belphie!” she heard from behind them. “Don’t drown her.”

She’d recognized Belphegor’s voice before, but it was slowly dawning on her that he was very shirtless under the spray as well. The humour of his greeting came to her afterwards.

Turning so that the stream hit his shoulder, the water trickled down on to her where it pooled at her thighs. A small waterfall of grey and pink slid down from her before long.

She didn’t notice the colour of the water changing, missing it entirely as Beelzebub stepped into the shower as well. ‘Oh my. So grumpy. So cute.’ She wanted to snuggle him and feed him pudding until he smiled again, amongst other things.

“Useless,” Beelzebub said, his mouth downturned. His annoyance was audible with the noise he made by cranking the shower controls just behind Belphegor. The way it screeched made her think he’d pulled it off the wall.

‘Did I do something wrong?’ she wondered briefly. No, he never spoke to her like that. She stared at him and waited for clarity, unable to see past the bodies around her, but still pleased with the view.

“Have you never used this before?” he asked.

‘It’s raining inside?’ she thought. The ceiling was different now. Only a narrow band at the front of the shower enclosure wasn’t covered in the pitpat of hot rain. It finally made sense why the stall was so large but the showerhead so small.

“I didn’t know it could do that,” she said, shielding her eyes to try and peer upwards. It was cozy curled up in Belphegor’s arms. Small snippets of Mammon holding her like this, talking to her in the cold wind, flickered to the fore of her mind and disappeared before she could examine them. ‘This is surreal. Nothing hurts. Am I dreaming? Maybe this is actually heaven.’

“Why am I not surprised that Mammon never showed you how things work,” Belphegor said.

She harshly pinched the skin of her bicep between her fingers before Beelzebub could snatch her hand away. His expression looked at her as though she were pouring perfectly good soup on the floor.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Belphegor asked. The usual boredom and hint of judgement had supplanted the earlier teasing.

“Checking to see if I’m dead or dreaming,” she said with only a little embarrassment.

“Oh?” he asked, falling back to amusement. “Do you often dream of us in the shower with you?”

Hopefully, she could pass off the heat of her face as a result of the water warming her.

Beelzebub’s curiosity was palpable next to her as he fidgeted. He kept glancing at her. No luck then.

“Um, well. No. Not before, but I…” She blushed brightly and tried to find an interesting spot on the wall. “I might have to now.”

She felt Belphegor’s laughter through his chest before she heard it. ‘At least Beel looks as flustered as I feel,’ she thought. The way her heart beat, it felt as light and rapid as hummingbird wings.

“It’s safe for her to stand,” Beelzebub said. “You can put her down.”

Belphegor squeezed her closer and lifted her higher. “I know. I just don’t want to.”

His hold on her, warm and protective, muddled the feelings in her chest. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she let herself melt into him.

“Belphie,” Beelzebub said, with a sternness she didn’t usually associate with him.

She closed her eyes and just enjoyed the feeling of his skin against her, debating whether to step down or curl up in his warmth and never move again. It felt like finally drinking water after days in the desert. After all the numbness and pain, as much as she probably should listen to whatever Beelzebub was saying, she didn’t want to let go.

“We’re supposed to be taking care of her,” Beelzebub said. ‘I can’t knock him out while he’s holding her,’ he thought.

“Hmm. Okay, well, you take care of her, and I’ll make her feel good. Seems like a satisfactory plan to me.”

Blinking away the water, she opened her eyes when Beelzebub ran his finger across her arm from elbow to shoulder. He held it up as evidence, and she wrinkled her nose at the layer of grime he’d scraped off of her with so little effort.

‘It isn’t as though we’ve never worn a mantle of slaughter before,’ Belphegor thought, and rolled his eyes, broadcasting his disinclination to release her. ‘There’s nothing to be squeamish about.’

The grumble of discontent from Belphegor was short lived when she wiggled her legs to be put down.

As he set her down, Beelzebub had reached for her immediately.

‘Belphie is probably still glowering,’ she thought, facing away from him. ‘Hopefully, he doesn’t stay in a snit for too long.’

Beelzebub’s fingertips skated over the sides of her underwear and she tried not to be self-conscious of his hands on her. ‘This is no different than my bathing suit after all. And it’s not like they haven’t seen me naked,’ she thought. ‘Then why does it feel so different?’

Thoughts of herself fell away as she watched the water slide down from Beelzebub’s shoulders. The way it made his boxers cling to his body was sinful. This was nothing like that gentle moment when, his hands on her hips, he’d helped steady her on the ladder in the pantry. ‘If Belphegor is water in the desert, Beel is a full course meal,’ she thought, and realized she was staring again.

As much as she wanted to touch him too, the revulsion for her own sticky outer coating was stronger, and she tested her weight from side to side. Faint memories of stumbling were remembered by her legs. Something was missing, she knew. She vaguely remembered what had happened, but it all seemed disjointed and far away, as if it had happened to someone else.

The twins busied themselves with passing soap and washing the blood off themselves and she tried to concentrate on standing steadily when Beelzebub’s hands left her hips. It was embarrassing how easily she was distracted by the trails of water that followed the defined muscles of his arms.

Washing her face gave her more time to try and reel her mind back from the eyefull before her, and from delving into memories from The Fall. ‘I just need to do my best until things make sense again,’ she thought. ‘Everything will fall back into place. It’s safe here. Right? At the very least, I know Beel won’t let me slip in the shower.’

She glanced back and watched as Belphegor tilted his head to rinse out his hair while she soaped her own debris filled hair. Their silence was beginning to unnerve her. Were they having another of their silent communications? ‘Maybe they never actually stop conversing?’ she wondered.

“This is so gross,” she said, feeling the grit and squish within her hair as she washed it. Washing her hair usually relaxed her, but this time, vestiges of fear tried to creep in. ‘This is no different from the shock of first arriving,’ she thought, ‘I just need to get used to the idea that it all happened.’

Tired of staring at the two of them together, Belphegor unhooked the showerhead and moved her hands away to rinse out the mess she’d made of her hair.

Her lips quirked upward as she felt the beginnings of laughter percolating. Beelzebub caught her eye and the matching glint of mirth she saw there broke the dam. She was shaking with silent laughter while he covered his mouth and looked away.

“Are you two that exhausted that you’re already hysterical?” Belphegor asked, his voice disinterested. That he’d stopped rinsing out her hair was a testament to just how interested he was.

“Sorry. It’s nothing,” she said, trying not to cough from the water and laughter. It felt good to laugh. She had no idea what had set Beelzebub off, but it didn’t matter. Sometimes laughter really was the best medicine.

“Yeah, Beel feels like he’s going to explode with amusement. Try again.”

“I couldn’t tell you,” she said, her voice still higher than normal as the giggles threatened to take her again.

Beelzebub tried to keep a straight face, not to look at either of them, while returning his hand to her hip. He nodded to the nozzle in his twin’s hand.

‘He wouldn’t actually know about that would he?” she thought, the smile falling from her face. ‘The last thing I need is Lucifer mad at me for divulging that.’ Her hand came up to tap at her tip. “I don’t even know if we’re laughing at the same thing.” she said, stalling for time, but the probing look from Belphegor didn’t disappear.

“I’m surprised Satan and Levi didn’t tell him.”

Her eyes went wide. “Why do you know about that?” she asked, shock making her question more shrill. 

Belphegor tugged on a clean lock of hair, trying to regain her attention, but she sucked her lips into her mouth, turning them under to hide the pink of them and the words behind them.

‘Why am I the one embarrassed to talk about it?’ she wondered, her cheeks beginning to grow warm again.

“Lucifer had to wash her hair when she was sick,” Beelzebub said without further pressure.

Using his hands in her hair, Belphegor steered her into his sights where a mixture of emotions greeted her. In his eyes she saw concern and jealousy, but mostly a tremendous amount of schadenfreude lived in the smile that overtook him.

She held up two fingers for Beelzebub to see. “Twice,” she said, still unable to look away from Belphegor.

Expecting Beelzebub to laugh, instead she found herself distracted from his amusement as she was scooped back up into Belphegor’s arms.

“Clearly, I can’t let you out of my sight. Fighting demons, forcing Lucifer to wash you. You’re just a menace!”

“Do that all you want,” Beelzebub told him. “She still needs to get clean.” He pursed his lips at the lack of progress and took up the dropped nozzle to rinse away the worst of the suds and gore that had made its way out of her hair and down her body.

“Ah, that’s, that’s okay,” she said, growing shy when he collected the soap and washcloth and began scrubbing at her arm. The details of the day were starting to come back to plague her, but the current situation was surreal enough to keep it at bay a little longer.

“I can manage!” she said, squirming away from the cloth. As much of a fantasy as this was, this was very fast. They’d only kissed for the first time less than a week ago, and already so much passion had happened since then. Her head hadn’t stopped swimming since. It was beginning to feel like too much, too soon.

“You can’t say you can manage and pull away from him just to press yourself into me, Princess,” Belphegor said, laughing. “You’re making me think you didn’t even come in here to get clean.”

Her stomach fluttered at the unfamiliar pet name. “Well, I won’t lie, I have no recollection of coming in here at all,” she said, cracking a smile. “Nice surprise though.”

She shifted uncomfortably in the cradle of his arms as Beelzebub began to work soap between her fingers. It was a strange sensation.

“Alright, alright,” Belphegor sighed, and set her down. “You take legs. I’ll take top.”

“Hey now! I didn’t agree to this!” she said, but Beelzebub had already dropped to a knee and lifted her foot. The quick movement tilted her back into Belphegor and replaced her protest with a yelp of surprise. ‘I doubt I’ll be able to leave without commanding them,’ she thought. It was both reassuring and concerning.

“Belphie? Are you naked?” she asked tentatively.

“Very,” he replied. The soap bar now under his palm, he slowly slid it under her arm and across her stomach.

There was nothing she could say to that. You’re not supposed to be naked in my bathroom wasn’t exactly a great line when she had already stripped in front of him earlier today. ‘When did Beel pass him the soap?’

Beelzebub was no help for her cause and didn’t look up, but his hands felt glorious. ‘I need to remember to ask him for a massage one day,’ she thought, trying not to turn into a puddle of hedonistic human goo.

Any touch felt good right now. It pulled her back down to the ground and helped tether her to reality again. She released some of the tension in her body and relaxed back against Belphegor’s chest.

“Better,” he said, leaving a small kiss on her cheek. “But lean forward a bit for me?” he asked, his soapy palm now on her hip. She bent at the waist, unable to do otherwise as Beelzebub’s hands were high on her thigh. In an instant her bra fell away, bouncing off Beelzebub’s shoulder and landing at her feet.

Her hands sprang to cover herself just as Belphegor pulled her back against him.

“Muuuuch better,” he purred into her ear, inching his fingers higher to soap along her ribs, catching his fingers against her folded arms.

The small “ _tsk_ ” he gave her made her sheepish and her hands moved away, hovering just off of her skin. He’d given her a small amount of banter, but his actions had all been considerate. It wasn’t fair of her to assume the worst.

‘Holy hell,’ she thought, closing her eyes to try and get her bearings. Clearly, she realized as his hands quickly surged up to cup her breasts, she should have assumed ‘worst.’

His hands swept over her repeatedly, presumably to soap her and not just to touch her and thumb her nipples to peaks. Swallowing the sound of her unexpected pleasure, she brought her arms back down protectively, and his hands slipped away to her shoulders.

She squeaked as Beelzebub’s fingers met the crease of her thigh and pelvis, brushing his hands along the edges of the lace there before moving back down to her other foot. He’d inadvertently distracted her from scolding his twin.

Belphegor’s hands brought shivers to her as he caressed her neck and shoulders. He tugged at her unwashed arm, pulling it away from its shielding duty.

“Belphie,” she scolded quietly, shifting to better cover herself with her remaining arm.

“It’s nothing I haven’t enjoyed with my hands and my eyes before,” he reassured her, and paused. “And mouth”

She could only imagine the smirk on his face as she blushed. ‘How can he say these things in front of Beel? Does he want to make him upset?’ she wondered. He knew she didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.

“And if you’re worried about Beel seeing anything, I’m quite certain he knows you inside and out after the amount of healing he did tonight.”

He’d said it.

Beelzebub’s hands froze on her thigh.

She felt the large shower stall closing in around her. ‘Fuck. He just had to say it. Why can’t everything stay fuzzy and far away? Well, so much for that,’ she thought as Beelzebub dropped the wash cloth and pressed his cheek against her stomach.

He twined his arms around her thighs and for a few heart beats he seemed content with breathing there heavily.

Not a peep was heard from Belphegor as he suddenly found intense interest in soaping up her back.

A deep breath to dispel some of the gathering anxiety and she was almost ready to tackle this.

‘For someone so smart, he can be so stupid sometimes,’ she thought. Slowly, she released her chest from its defenses and her hands swept back Beelzebub’s wet hair, gently petting him with one hand and holding him in place with the other. A deep sound filled the room. It was beautiful and mournful, like a whale’s song. Two tones pitching different melodies, harmonizing lowly together to fill the room. It took her breath away and shook the water in the air. It was too much a reflection of her own pain and fear as it grew louder. She wanted to curl in on herself and let it shake her too. Let it drag out and express all the terror and sadness and wonder she’d experienced in the Devildom.

It wouldn’t do to leave him like this though. “Let go,” she said. Her words were soft, but it was a command nonetheless.

The sound from Beelzebub stuttered as his arms moved away. He still encircled her but no longer touched her. Even Belphegor’s hands had lifted off of her.

As quickly as she could, she dropped to her own knees, and forced Beelzebub to lift his gaze with her hand. His head was still bowed, but at least she could see him now.

It wasn’t often she could read her demons so easily. His shoulders slumped forward, elbows tucked in to protect his sides.. The worst was the confusion she saw in his eyes, the way they partially squeezed closed and couldn’t hold her gaze. ‘My command did this. Made him shrink even further away,’ sht thought. There was a heavy ache in her chest that had nothing to do with her previous injuries.

Lunging the short distance forward, she hugged him, her arms around his neck. His bent leg pressed securely against the side of her waist, still ensuring her safety even in his pain.

This was meant to console him, but she found herself hiding and reassuring herself in his warmth as well. Her arm wrapped around his shoulder as she tried to cover his back; the other took its place soothing the back of his neck. The gentle strokes of her fingers along his nape calmed some of the sound that radiated out from him and soon his arms locked back around her.

‘It must’ve been horrible to find me like that,’ she realized. She would have been distraught if the roles had been reversed. ‘Would I have even been able to think well enough to help if the roles were reversed?’

The rumbling that came with the tightening of his embrace was lighter, softer. ‘Relief?’ she tried to translate. There was just too much sound. She had to ask. “Beel?” she whispered from her nook at his collar bone.

There was no response except for a sniffle. Sliding her arms from around him, she tried to push away to better see him, but he wouldn’t budge. ‘Is he crying?’ she wondered.

“It’s okay, Beel,” she said and wrapped herself around him again, beginning to pet his hair. “Everything’s okay.” It felt like she was trying to convince herself too. She was glad he still held her tightly.

The water above hid his tears, but she knew he was still crying while bent over her. When she pressed a kiss to his shoulder he hiccoughed. So she did it again. Against her, his tensed muscles unclenched from the worst of their shaking, and unhurriedly she stretched to leave small kisses on his neck, encouraging him to relax further. There was nothing sexual about their embrace or the chaste distractions she left on his skin.

“My poor, sweet Beel,” she said, as the sobs wracked his body again. ‘How long has he been holding this in? How long did he work to save me?’ He wouldn’t let her see his face and guilt flooded her stomach.

The rumbling from him cut off abruptly when he coughed to suck in air. He’d forgotten to breathe. The silence before that cough had been more painful to her than his weeping.

“Thank you,” she told him, arching back to place her cheek against his head bent low over her. “I’d be d--”

Beelzebub moved without thinking. His mouth was on hers, ravenous and desperate. ‘I never want to hear those words,’ was all he could think. He didn’t want to remember the pallor of her skin, or see it ever again.

She was safe, he’d seen to that. Everything was fine, but his hands still needed to track everywhere they could reach to be sure. He didn’t even know what he was looking for as his mouth traversed everywhere he could reach, moving frantically without thought.

Placating touches surrounded him. Her words were white noise, soothing, reassuring. He realized he was crying again when her words began to filter through to him once more.

It had happened so gradually, she didn’t notice at first that one of Beelzebub’s hands had left her. She saw it was held between both of Belphegor’s now. ‘I’m glad he’s here for Beel,’ she thought.

This she understood. This type of reassurance that she’d thought was so innately human. She didn’t try to move him, only kissed him softly when he brought his face to hers again.

“Sorry, I--” he started.

“No, there’s nothing be sorry about,” she said and kissed his cheekbone with firm pressure until she reached his temple.

“But…”

“Do you remember what you said to me after you caught me crying in the kitchen that first week?” she asked him, stroking his back again, this time with a firmer hand. In times like these, gentleness could feel to ethereal and unreal.

He shook his head. He couldn’t think that far away, pummeled as he was under a waterfall of emotions. Instead, he soaked her in, letting the warm water sliding down them suction him to her skin.

“After you asked me if I’d seen your cupcakes, you told me it was okay to cry because even the clouds rain when things get heavy,” she said. “I think today had some pretty dark clouds that required rain.”

His breathing slowed as he held on to her words, turning them over and remembering.

“I was so scared,” he admitted as his arms trembled around her.

She pushed away the hair that the shower had washed back over his eyes. She looked at him, unwaveringly. “I know,” she said with a soft smile. “Me too.”

His forehead rested against hers while they waited for his breathing to return to normal. Finally, he dropped his other leg to the floor and sat back to lean against the wall, taking her with him.

“Beel,” Belphegor said, a gentle warning lacing his voice. Their hands were still connected over her shoulder, but now Beelzebub was much shorter and ensconced in her breasts, and he didn’t seem to have any intention of letting go soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspiration taken from this quote:  
> It's okay to cry when there's too much on your mind - The clouds rain too when things get heavy - Amina Mehmood
> 
> And of course, gimme all your comments. I love your reactions, concrit, and mad fan theories. <3


	70. Where's My Kiss?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beel doesn't want to let go of his favourite human after a scare. Belphegor tries to be patient. MC hasn't yet figured out how to avoid the tug of war.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone!
> 
> Thank you all for your support. The hiatus didn't go at all as planned, but don't worry, this fic will keep updating even if the pace is slow <3
> 
> I wasn't able to get through the full tidy up of previous chapters, but I'm pretty darn close to completing the first comb through.
> 
> Now, more importantly:  
> A happy belated birthday to AwkwardSilence.  
> AND a massive thank you to Dalektable for her constant diligence and keen insight. This fic would be a hodgepodge of smut without her.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

_His forehead rested against hers while he let his breathing return to normal. Finally, he dropped his other leg to the floor and sat back to lean against the wall, taking her with him._

_“Beel,” Belphegor said, a gentle warning lacing his voice. Their hands were still connected over her shoulder, but now Beelzebub was much shorter and ensconced in her breasts, and he didn’t seem to have any intention of letting go soon._

Beelzebub huffed stubbornly against her chest and cinched her more fully against his body.

She looked over her shoulder to Belphegor, uncertain what to do. He knew his brother best.

“Beel, we’re supposed to be taking care of her, not using her as a squeeze toy. You said so yourself,” Belphegor said, releasing Beelzebub’s hand from his own. To his chagrin, it only gave Beelzebub another arm to gather her in. ‘Honestly...’ he thought, until the small breathy “Ah!” that echoed through the shower enclosure had him narrowing his eyes. He could feel the need and contentment building in Beelzebub, could hear her breathing start to pull deeper, and that little sound she made at the back of her throat when she was trying not to react.

When Beelzebub’s hand dipped to her waistband, she held her breath. ‘Comfort sex might not be the worst idea,’ she thought before she felt an opposing hand on her other hip and Belphegor at her back. She could feel his hand holding the lace in place, halting the disappearance of her last covering, not that Beelzebub seemed to mind. His only reaction was a hum against her skin, fogging up her mind further as his mouth and tongue continued to roam her bust.

‘These two…damned if I do, damned if I don’t,’ she thought, letting the slide of Belphegor’s hand from her hip go unchecked as it dipped low across her abdomen. They were a good distraction from the chaos of earlier.

The feeling of surreality was reinforced by the sensation of being lifted up again away. ‘Like floating,’ she thought as she watched Beezelbub follow her, never letting her completely leave the circle of his arms. His lips were only separated from her by Belphegor’s fingers filling his mouth, forcing a fraction of detachment until he stood to his full height.

The growl he emitted around the fingers had her weak in the knees; something so dangerous shouldn’t have any right to be so seductive. The air around them fluttered with Beelzebub’s frustration and power, but he didn’t bite down on the intruding fingers. Instead, she watched them slowly withdraw and she swallowed thickly, warring over whether she wanted the same treatment or to replace those fingers with her tongue.

By the time Blephegor’s fingers made their way to her lips and slipped under her chin, her eyes were already half closed with want; she tilted her head back without hesitation. She could feel Beelzebub’s eyes on her. When she looked up she saw him licking his lips, but she didn’t stop Belphegor from kissing her, content to lock eyes with Beelzebub while his twin kissed her slowly and deeply.

She could see Beelzebub trying to rein in his transformation as his horns and wings began to flicker into existence. His flare of power was the only thing that halted their kiss. The accompanying squeeze of her hip as Belphegor released her lips made it impossible to keep her eyes open any longer. A tiny “ah” escaped her again as she strained for more, and she felt a corresponding pulse through Beelzebub’s wet boxer shorts, insistent against her belly. She peeked up at him, finding his eyes closed and his teeth sunken into his lower lip.

“Hmm,” Belphegor said, breaking the concentration of her reverent stare with a thrumming from his chest, too low to hear but easily felt. “I expected Beel not to let go, but, my dear, I didn’t expect your hands to still be on him.”

Slowly, under his scrutiny, she began to lower her hands from the chiselled chest before her, lifting away until only her fingertips touched Beelzebub. ‘It’s always so difficult not to follow his suggestions,’ she thought. It was an oddity for her in The House of Egocentrics, but that was part of what made it so tempting to obey: the wrongness of it. He said what she wanted to hear and made it too easy to listen.

The sight of water trailing down Beelzebub’s musculature in rivulets stalled the last of her movement away, and she found herself ignoring Belphegor’s words in favour of ogling and touching. Her hands moved back up across the muscled expanse of skin until they reached Beelzebub’s shoulders again. ‘So beautiful,’ she thought before freezing, realizing her action would only stoke their rivalry. ‘Oh, dear.’ She watched Beelzebub shift from concerned to pleased, his smile quickly evolving. A shame it wasn’t aimed at her.

Belphegor’s breath at her neck was warmer than the water around them, and she heard his “ _Tsk tsk_ ” just above her right shoulder.

She could dig her way out of this. ‘I just need to distract and deflect long enough to get clean. No one needs to have hurt feelings and then I can go to sleep without worry.’ Thinking back to their tryst after lunch, she debated playing into the game, and using his own words to stall and confuse. “You didn’t ask me not to touch,” she said as innocently as she could. “You only said to wait until you got home, and you were home by supper.”

Belphegor straightened away from her ear. “That certainly sounds like something a demon would say. Loopholes won’t save you, though,” he said, walking his fingertips down her neck before letting them wander to her sternum. “Beel, did you know that my sweet princess here is absolutely debauched?”

She inhaled deeply, uncertain where he was going with this. The muscles of her stomach tightened with a cocktail of emotions: suspicion, anticipation, wonder. It was embarrassing how much even the slightest recognition or teasing from him turned her on. Shifting her knees ever so slightly, she hoped he wouldn’t notice her attempt to relieve a small amount of the pressure that had quickly built at the apex of her thighs. It was unlikely: his arm was still settled inflexibly just above her hip bones. ‘Fucking demons,’ she thought, more exasperated with the way he seemed to be stacking the deck against her.

“Oh yes,” he continued, sliding a hand from its place on her sternum to stroke her breast, still sensitive from Beelzebub’s attentions. “This sweet, little angel admitted she would have stayed to watch us play.”

She gasped and started forward when he tweaked her nipple, bringing her closer to the wall of muscle in front of her. This was starting to become a bit more than she had bargained for.

Using her momentum, Beelzebub pulled her flush against him, trapping Belphegor’s hand between them.

“I don’t think it’s very fair that she’s had you all to herself, Beel. It means I’m missing out doubly.”

‘He doesn’t sound very put out,’ she thought before her mind went blank again. His hand was trapped but not immobile she realized.

Belphegor continued teasing her in his hand while he reached for Beelzebub with the other, connecting their mouths hungrily over her, and sandwiching her more tightly between them. The only thing shielding her was the circle of Beelzebub’s arms and Belphegor’s hand, which was dedicatedly working to steal away her thoughts.

“You’ll have to choose eventually,” he reminded her between heated kisses.

With the water blinding her, she looked down, away from the temptation above her. “Between two evils is not worth choosing,” she said, repeating a proverb as she leaned her cheek against Beelzebub’s chest, and tried not to squeak or moan when Belphegor rolled her nipple between his thumb and finger. ‘That seemed like a safe, if cheeky, answer,’ she thought. They were the only words she could muster while watching them together, listening to them pant above her. ‘Fuck, they’re gorgeous.’

“We’ll see about that,” Belphegor said, between kisses.

‘I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m sure I’ve jinxed myself somehow,’ she thought, while Beelzebub’s warmth disappeared from against her. The room was warm, but still too cold without him to rest against. It felt like disappointment. “Beel?” she asked, blinking away water.

With one hand still at her waist, he hadn’t stepped far away, and she heard the loud creak of the shower knob again. The temperature remained the same, but the water fell meagerly now, giving her a better view of the demon she’d been comforting only moments ago. ‘Is he up for this kind of comfort?’ she wondered. ‘Am I?’

No longer occupied in Beelzebub’s hair, Belphegor’s hand fingered the waistband of her underwear, and the urge to rise up on her tiptoes to meet him was a quick answer to her question. ‘Definitely. Definitely ready.’

She crooked her finger, and Beelzebub returned to her, pulling her hands up to touch more of him as he did. “You can touch me as much as you want,” he said shyly, though whether he was reserved because of her attention, or because Belphegor was watching, she couldn’t be certain.

Unfortunately, it was difficult to entice Beelzebub to kiss her as Belphegor’s hand gently encircled her neck, holding her in place while he slid his other hand over her panties. She couldn’t move forward at all. At first, she tensed in fear. She knew the ability he had to crush the life out of her. ‘It would be so easy,’ she thought. ‘No, Beelzebub would have felt his intentions. Belphegor wouldn’t have bound himself to me, befriended me, kissed me, if he wanted to snuff out my life. He’s not that patient.’

She relaxed against Belphegor’s chest, the only tension remaining was that of anticipation, and a need to wash away the violence of the night. ‘I may never get over my death, but for now, give me something mind numbing,’ she thought. ‘Give me something distracting and beautiful to destroy the thoughts of everything else from tonight’.

Impatiently, she recognized that there was a conversation going on above her that she wasn’t privy to; she was just their background sound as Belphegor pulled tiny whimpers from her, and her fingers drummed at Beelzebub’s shoulders impatiently.

At least she knew they were having trouble concentrating. Beelzebub’s eyes constantly flitted down to her as she shifted, impatient with the small touches and small space. She didn’t need to guess whether she had Belphegor’s full attention. Even with the shower washing everything away, his cock was still slick with precome and pressed against her back. He couldn’t ignore her if he tried. She wiggled just to make sure.

His hand slid into her panties. She stilled, and so did he. ‘Sweet Caduceus! He _would_ stop moving the moment I do!’

“It seems my princess is restless,” Belphegor said, gently stringing out her emotions and her nerves as his finger moved so very, very close to slipping inside her.

She almost didn’t hear his words, so intent was she on the movement over her mons and the collar of his hand at her throat.

“I have a deep desire to know how much your body can take," he whispered to her, dragging his finger along the length of her lips. His mouth brushed against the shell of her ear, and his voice seemed much louder with the water falling softer than before. "I want to see you let sensation take control of you, and expose you bare to me. Make you feel until you can’t resist what you already know."

The pulse that drummed in her veins demanded action, but she kept herself from pressing into him or onto him. Her hands balled into fists on Beelzebub’s chest before she could stop herself. The rest she contained by breathing deeper than before. She wouldn’t let him win that easily.

“Your body is always so honest with me, isn’t it?” he said, withdrawing his hand from below. “Let’s see what it chooses.”

The heat that had pooled in her abdomen began to cool with disappointment as Belphegor released his hold on her throat. It all came rushing back as he brought his hand up to the base of her skull and tangled his hands in her hair, re-capturing her mouth as Beelzebub kissed her neck and let his hands roam hungrily over her body.

All of her breathy cries were stolen and all of her sight filled with Belphegor as he held her in place possessively. Blind to everything but him, each caress from Beelzebub was a surprise to her. There was no way to anticipate where his hands or mouth would land next.

The contrast of Beelzebub’s tender touch and Belphegor’s demanding kiss was overwhelming. Beelzebub’s hands slid over curves with only a hint of his nails, or the catch of his thumbs over her nipples, each sensation was soft and worshipful. Everywhere he touched, he followed with his mouth before moving lower, and it wasn’t until his tongue reached her hip bone that she found herself being reeled back against Belphegor.

Anchored upright, she felt his arm secure her ribcage against him after her attempt to press herself closer to Beelzebub’s mouth. Head still angled back, blind to her body below, she jumped when Beelzebub’s hands massaged her inner thighs, and left small bites before sliding his tongue just under the band of her underwear.

‘I’m going to burn all of my underwear,’ she thought. ‘If they’re going to keep using it as a stopping point I’ll burn every last pair.’ Her frustrated cries were devoured by the avatar of sloth, and her gasp as Beelzebub’s mouth found her neck only seemed to encourage him further.

Gentle scraping of teeth along her neck had her straining to pull Beelzebub closer. She hooked her fingers into the wet fabric of his boxers, pulling him as close as she could. Sandwiched between them as she was, and surrounded by sensation, there was no chance for her to debate the merits of whatever this was any longer. ‘I want this,’ she thought. ‘Might even need this.’

Beelzebub slid her panties just low enough for them to fall on their own.

It was still impossible to see anything besides Belphegor and rain, but she felt the draw of lace down her thighs and heard them slap against the floor. Futilely, she tried to bring Beelzebub closer in a way she needed. Her hands wandered up over the swell of his shoulders and biceps, but touching him seemed to distract him, daze him into inaction. She imagined he had his eyes closed, as he had when savouring her touch for the first time in the gym.

She removed a hand from Beelzebub, and wound her arm up around Belphegor’s neck, earning an encouraging hum from him. The sound spurred Beelzebub back into the moment, yet it wasn’t enough to completely banish the distress that hovered at the back of her mind, waiting for a quiet time to remind her of death.

“That’s my girl,” Belphegor said, finally letting her breathe, panting and open-mouthed. With the way her swollen lips parted, still wet, and tilted towards him, it was difficult not to steal her mouth again. ‘Soon,’ he thought and reminded himself to be patient. ‘For now, I can enjoy watching her lose herself.’

“Why…” she started to ask, but her question fell away when Beelzebub’s tongue circled her nipple. When he alternated his hands and mouth she forgot the topic altogether. She wasn’t sure she could keep this up.

“Your honesty would save time for all of us,” Belphegor answered her, stroking her wet hair, “but we can take the scenic route if you’re undecided.”

She was uncertain of so many things, straddling the state between awareness and bliss. What was she supposed to be doing again? Not long ago, her only purpose had been to survive, but now she kept falling between confusion and intense sensation. Maybe this was still survival. Her breathing was trying to out pace her heart while her mind tried to catch up to her libido and make sense of it all.

“May I?” she heard as Beelzebub’s hands passed over her thighs again, kneading impatiently, pleading. Looking down, she found him again on his knees, resting his head between the points of her hips. His breath was noticeable against her skin even amidst the steam of the shower.

“Tell me what you need, Beel,” she managed to say. She knew his question had been just for her.

“Please, let me taste you again,” he asked, his hands hesitant on the backs of her legs.

In this, at least, she knew what was needed of her and what she wanted. Belphegor still held her in place, but her fingertips could reach Beelzebub. She pushed his head away from her and held him in place. Those eyes could melt her no matter what they asked for.

“Can you make me come harder than last time?” she asked, her eyes half closing and obscuring her dilated pupils. ‘I just want to touch all of him,’ she thought.

“I can rise to the challenge when needed,” he said, surprising her with the hint of conceit in his words and his lopsided grin.

“Raise my leg over your shoulder,” she said quietly, hiding her delight and amusement at his cheeky smile.

When her knee was over his shoulder, she dug her heel into his back, bringing him closer. ‘I need to pace myself until I can figure out how to avoid hurting any feelings,’ she thought. ‘Maybe they’ll forget once we’re all worn out?’

He strained to listen for her next command.

“One lick to start,” she said, knowing full well it would only build his longing to taste her. She’d given him a single grape once, and let him hold the whole bunch, waiting to see how long he’d last. His discipline broke in under a minute, and she expected no less now.

The way his muscled arm wrapped around her thigh, already hiked over his shoulder, was beautiful to look at. When he slid his tongue slowly over her clit, she shuddered with pleasure more quickly than she’d expected, already worked up. ‘He’s practically a piece of art like that,’ she thought.

Her head fell back against Belphegor’s shoulder as her mind emptied of thought outside of Beelzebub’s tongue. She’d expected him to stop, to wait for her next direction, but tension sparked and spread throughout her body as he continued to paint her slowly with his tongue. A sly and artful disrespect to her instruction.

‘Definitely a demon,’ she thought as her mind struggled to recognize that he’d never changed pace, only shifted pressure as he trailed large to small circles and back again. ‘Still just one,’ she thought, as she trembled and it began to overwhelm her.

“‘One’ seems to mean something very different to the two of you,” she said, between gasps. Belphegor’s redemption of “one” kiss had been no different.

When Beelzebub finally slid his tongue inside her, she was grateful for Belphegor’s steadying arm; the leg on which she stood had gone weak. The intrusion was too slow, too much, and not enough all at once. When Beelzebub finally leaned away, she tried to stifle the sounds of her yearning with the back of her hand. ‘More,’ she thought, her body trying to move toward him even before the idea finished forming.

Belphegor pulled her hand away to better hear her pleasure. “Why don’t you show her how quickly you can get her off, Beel?” he asked before sliding his hand down to lazily stroke her side.

The shudder that wracked her body had nothing to do with touch. ‘They’re working together?’ she wondered.

Quick to move the trespassing hand off of her, Beelzebub replaced it with his own.

‘No, of course they wouldn’t be,’ she thought. ‘This can’t just be about comfort and connection. They have to include their petty rivalry.’

Beelzebub’s amethyst eyes practically glowed when they looked up at her again, waiting. She watched them slide closed in pleasure at her nod of assent before he let his free hand begin to roam her body.

“You look so good on your knees, Beel,” she said, and felt his hands tighten around her thigh and hip in response. ‘I wonder if I can take a page out of Asmo’s book and fuck my way out of this tug of war?’

She tried to arch into Beelzebub, but he held her still to trail more bites along her inner thighs. Gradually, he allowed her to move more, as with every nip he would turn and meet her hips until she was fucking herself on his face, and the nipping had stopped entirely.

“Are you—are you sure it’s a good idea to be—helping your competition?” she asked Belphegor, her eyes fluttering as she tried to keep them open, and keep her mind focused on her sights instead of the emotions within.

‘Stop filling your thoughts with jealousy instead of me,’ she wanted to say. She pushed the sullen idea away. ‘No, thoughts like that will only conjure other, darker feelings. I want to hide from those tonight.’

Focusing on the way they Belphegor held her immobile, and Beelzebub flicked his tongue, she let her thoughts blur. It was as if her memories of getting off after lunch had collided with one another. ‘I was the trophy for their competition then too.’

“Quite sure.” Confident laughter rumbled through Belphegor and into her. “I can’t win properly if he won’t give you his all.”

‘It seems I still am just a trophy,’ she thought. They were overwhelming her senses, but inside her still stormed with insecurity.

“No sound,” Beelzebub said, surfacing to jab a nail into his twin’s arm.

“Did I say you could stop?” she asked, her voice, nearly breathless, falling down to him.

It wasn’t quite disapproval he heard, but something just short of magisterial. She hadn’t said his name, but her fingers were in his hair without their usual caress. He could feel Belphegor’s amusement at his own annoyance and disappointment.

“Beel, I asked you a question.”

Her hands became soft, petting everywhere she could reach. If he could keep her hands on him forever, he’d give up custard. He’d give up anything to get this feeling to continue.

“No,” he said hoarsely.

“No, what?”

“No, you didn’t say I could stop.” It was difficult to meet her eyes. He wanted to taste all of her, sate himself with her kisses, fall apart in her hugs and soft love.

“Hmmm. That just won’t do,” she said, removing her hands from him to slowly slide them along her own body, passing over his grip and Belphegor’s to find more of her own skin. “Should I take over then? Are you not able to continue?”

“Please, no,” he said, watching as she touched herself. He could feel his chance to be the one to love her slipping away and he unwound his arm from her leg to follow the path of her hands with his own.

“You’re so pretty when you beg,” she said, biting her lip, “but if I don’t come in the next few minutes…” She slid a finger into herself, dragging her thumb down her clit and back. “I’ll have to take matters into my o-own hands.”

One of her hands returned gently to his hair. He didn’t need any further encouragement, but she gave it to him anyway, proffering her coated finger to him, which he took greedily into his mouth.

When both her hands were back in his hair he sucked hard on her clit. “Ah—so good, Beel,” she said, her moan echoing through the bathroom. His name left her lips breathily again as he lapped at her, increasing the pressure, and quickly darting inside her. Her heel was digging into his back, holding him in place like a vice.

“You have thirty seconds, Beel,” she said. It didn’t matter; she hadn’t been keeping track of time. “Look at me.”

Fuck. She loved the way he looked up at her, like she was the only person in his entire world. “I'm going to make you look at me when I slide your cock into me. I can’t wait to see your eyes roll into the back of your head.”

He lifted her other leg so that her thighs were tight against his ears. His eyes closed blissfully as he groaned. That’s how she came, legs wrapped around him and toes curling. She strained against Belphegor’s arm, filled with Beelzebub’s tongue and a vibrating growl of happiness and need.

“Definitely harder than last time,” she said, her voice uneven. She continued to stroke his hair, as much to commend him as anchor herself back in reality. Carefully, he released her legs back down to the wet floor, but Belphegor kissed her and prolonged the sensation of floating.

It was always so satisfying for him to watch her fall apart, only marred by his waning patience, and the irritation being directed his way from Beelzebub. Belphegor sighed. “As much as I want you to be screaming my name, it’s only fair to let Beel fail miserably with his best efforts first.”

The way her eyes widened when she looked back at him with indignation did nothing to cool his eagerness. If anything, her will to defend his twin only made him want her more.

“Then you’d better release me,” she said, eyeing him dangerously. She reached for Beelzebub, drawing him up from where he knelt, instead of telling Belphegor exactly what she thought of his insults.

“Where’s my kiss?” she asked Beelzebub, her eyes softening from the anger she’d sent Belphegor’s way. “I want to taste myself in your mouth.”

He swallowed thickly, bringing his hands to cup her face.

“Don’t be shy,” she said, grabbing him and pulling him down to her. It was so adorable the way he tried not to moan when she slid her tongue past his lips to taste him. There was so much more bulk to him compared to her, but he was the one that gasped when she captured his lower lip between her teeth and squeezed his ass. ‘My sweet Beel,’ she thought as she soothed the bite to his lip with her tongue and softer kisses. ‘Even if he didn’t want more, I think I’d be content just to hold him close tonight.’ She would wrap herself around him right now, but Belphegor’s grip on her had not lessened enough.

“I believe I promised you that I’d watch you lose control as I sunk onto you,” she whispered to Beelzebub. “Sit at the front wall, where the water doesn’t reach. I’ll keep you warm.”

Quickly out of range, she moved to follow him, but Belphegor still hadn’t let go.

“ _Belphie_ , you’ll have to let go if you want to finish this,” she said. “This game was your idea after all.”

“I promise it’s not a game to me,” he said, nuzzling into her neck before releasing her completely. “Just having trouble relinquishing you.” He sighed when she stepped away. As much as he loved both of them, it was almost impossible to watch her walk away from him for his brother.

The tiny growl she felt following her was not nearly as confident as his words had been: need, concern, loneliness. Turning back, she planted a small kiss on his cheek, meeting his eyes once more. “If it’s not a game, then you should know that fucking me won’t make me anyone’s.”

She left him with more than a hint of challenge burning in his eyes, as she crossed the short distance to Beelzebub.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for reading! I'm looking forward to hearing from you all.
> 
> And, if you have the time and inclination, please have a peek at my little survey. <3 Missed you all!  
> https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DD38R8B


	71. Get Lucky

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC plays along with the tug of war going on around her, testing intentions, and debating whether to just go to bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

_“ **Belphie** , you’ll have to let go if you want to finish this,” she said. “This game was your idea after all.”_

_“I promise it’s not a game to me,” he said, nuzzling into her neck before releasing her completely. “Just having trouble relinquishing you.” He sighed when she stepped away. As much as he loved both of them, it was almost impossible to watch her walk away from him for his brother._

_The tiny growl she felt following her was not nearly as confident as his words had been: need, concern, loneliness. Turning back, she planted a small kiss on his cheek, meeting his eyes once more. “If it’s not a game, then you should know that fucking me won’t make me anyone’s.”_

_She left him with more than a hint of challenge burning in his eyes, as she crossed the short distance to Beelzebub._

* * *

“How did I ever get so lucky?” she said, looking Beelzebub up and down as he waited for her like a Greek statue, his back against the wall and his leg bent to rest his hand on it. She moved to sit in front of him, carefully tracing the red mark on his raised knee. “It seems,” she said, “I’ll need to get a mat if I’m going to keep you like that for very long.”

It was impossible not to see the hope in his eyes; he parted his legs at the smallest pressure from her hand, and she moved to sit between them.

“Beelzebub,” she said, her hands slipping over his hips and up to his shoulders as she leaned in closer. “You make me melt every time I see you smile, but your thighs absolutely make me want to sin.”

It felt so good to finally tell him, almost as good as watching him close his eyes and tilt his head back against the wall at her admission. ‘Is he hiding embarrassment,’ she wondered, ‘or trying to keep his urge to grab me at bay?’ His suppressed yearning was enticing no matter the reason.

Gliding her hands quickly down his arms, she pressed his hands against the tile floor. He kept them in place when she moved to kiss up his neck and palm his erection through the fabric between them. There was no point in playing hard to get now, not when she needed him to melt away the stress of the day.

The low sound he made as he pressed up into her hand for relief was intoxicating. ‘So strong, but so needy for me,’ she thought, struggling to separate whether his expression was inspiring love in her or lust. ‘Either way, I need to get him out of these before I lose my patience.’

‘So eager to please,’ she thought, as he lifted himself, while she pulled his underwear to bunched at his knees.

When she paused in disrobing him and circled his Adam's apple with her tongue, his fingers tapped excitedly on either side of him where she had left them. ‘Waiting is not his strong suit, but he’s trying so hard,’ she thought, remembering how frantically he’d kissed her before.

“Enough,” she said softly, motioning for him to set himself back down while she took the wet fabric off of him completely.

His blush spread lower down his chest, and a surge of annoyance made him look to his twin; she’d tossed his boxers at Belphegor’s feet. The smirk she showed him would have been enough to have him at attention instantly, were he not already painfully hard.

“My poor Beel,” she said, moving to kneel at his side. “That looks uncomfortable. Would you like some help with that?”

Those eyes of hers did things to his breathing when he saw them half lidded, pupils dilated, taking in as much of him as she could. He nodded quickly, not trusting his voice.

“Bring your knees down a little?” she asked, guiding them down with her palms. “So good for me,” she whispered, and turned his face to meet her kiss. She took their time, sliding her hands down his neck and caressing his shoulders. ‘Much better to admire with my hands,’ she thought, indulging in what had become her gym fantasy.

Slowly, she continued lower, her hands never quite reaching their goal before they’d return upward, or move lower to his thighs. Watching the strong demon melt under her touch, it was impossible not to feel powerful. ‘I’m pretty sure he could lift the entire house if he wanted to, but here he is, melting in my hands.’

“Tell me what you need, Beelzebub,” she said, cupping his face once more.

“I—” he started. “I need—”

Her sudden grip on his cock shorted out what remained of his ability to talk; he was thrusting up into her hand before he could think.

“That’s what I thought,” she said as she brought a leg over his lap. She pumped him slowly, waiting for recognition to return to his eyes.

Her other hand cupped his chin firmly, and it reminded him of how he’d accidentally fed her too roughly during their almost date at Hattusa. The image stuck in his mind, her waiting, blindfolded, trusting him; it had him squeezing his eyes shut again with emotion. He heard her voice clearly from his lap. “Hands on me,” she said. “If you take them off, I come off. Understood?”

“Yes.” His hands moved over the swell of her hips, trying to pull her closer, or coax her lower, but she continued to hover over him, just out of reach, rocking herself on the tip of his cock.

‘It’s worth it to tease myself if I get to watch him writhe like this,’ she thought. ‘I wonder what he’d be like if I refused to order him around?’ She moaned at the idea of him letting loose, imagining him transformed. “I forgot what a stretch you are for me,” she said, her voice low. “It’s a good thing I’m so wet for you.”

His hips surged up at her words, but her fist still held him at the base, thwarting his instincts. “Beel,” she said, chiding him. He had no idea how much she loved it when he lost control of his want for her.

“Sorry,” he said, panting. “I didn’t mean—”

She dropped down to the base of his cock without warning, and watched him shake and moan for her. “Perfect,” she said, after a moment of adjustment, leaning in to whisper it in his ear. Finally, she allowed him to pull her against his chest. “So handsome. So sweet, my Beel.” Stroking his wet hair, caressing his face, she waited as he blinked away the fog.

With her practically sealed to him, skin against skin everywhere he could reach, he rocked carefully inside her, testing. “Please let me show you how good for you I can be,” he said, blurting it out. “How good I can make you feel.” The pace she was setting was too leisurely for him to bear.

The combination of his own and Belphegor’s mounting lust made it too hard to stay still. Looking over her, to Belphegor, he saw him stroking himself to the same steady tempo of her grinding. Beelzebub tried to hold in the high pitched whine and raised his knees, trapping her completely over him.

“ _Beel_?’ she asked quietly, dragging out his name. “You’d never woo me like this just because of a sibling rivalry, right?”

Wrapping his arms around her tighter, her movement on him came to a halt. “Never,” he said, holding her as securely as he could without breaking her. “I promise I would never.” He rocked gently into her as he corrected himself. “We would never,” he said. “I would make it a vow of our pact if you asked it of me.”

His promise made it a physical need for her to kiss him, to drag every whine she could out of him, until there was nothing left but panting. The fervor of his words had shaken her, and reassured her. “I want to be the first thing you touch in the morning,” she said, whispering back the words he’d first healed her with in the gym, “and the last thing you taste at night.” She continued the slow, small movements between them, driving them steadily closer to losing control together.

The soft ‘please’ from him was enough for her to give them what they both wanted. “More,” she said. “You’re allowed to take a hand off of me.”

That was all he needed to hear. His body was shaking with need, desperate to sate himself inside her, next to her, whatever she’d allow. The slow grinding between them was going to drive him insane. He pushed off the wall and lay back, keeping her flush against his chest as he thrust deeply into her, arching his hips off the floor. He savoured the moment, biting her shoulder, and finally making her louder than his breathing.

“I’m going to ride you until you come for me,” she said, and pushed away to recline against his bent legs, thwarting the free hand that reached for her. ‘This is what I needed. Less thought, more feeling. Help me believe you.’

Their pace faltered when she changed the angle and he slid unexpectedly deeper inside her. He could feel her tightening and fluttering around his shaft, clearly getting close again; he only had to hold on for a little while longer.

Belphegor piped up from the other side of the large shower enclosure. “Beel, don’t let her finish too soon. Make sure she squims and begs for it first.”

‘The last thing I need is to hear from him right now.’ Beelzebub wanted all of his senses drenched in her, and only her. He saw her short lived glare for Belphegor, and it only turned him on more. Closing his eyes, he focused on the memory of her ire.

“Just looking at you makes me want to come,” she said to Beelzebub. “Sometimes at breakfast I think about stealing you away—” She moaned as his hand came up to circle her clit at the same quick rate he thrust into her. “Or just climbing onto your lap at the table, in front of everyone.” Her fingers bit into the back of his thighs as she tried to hold on to the world around her, but she was fast losing the battle as she sunk further into the growing haze of orgasm.

Letting out a long, slow breath, Beelzebub opened his eyes. It was too difficult not to lose himself in sensation with them closed, though they continued to try and fall shut on him.

“I have forgotten to breathe while watching you put food between your perfect lips,” she said, and took his hand away from her clit to bring it to her mouth. He needed to know just how much she wanted him. “I want to lick your throat every time I see you swallow.” She slid her tongue from his wrist to the tip of his thumb before placing it back on her other hip.

He was lifting her now to thrust into her harder, and he heard her curse and cry out, but she didn’t ask him to stop. It was impossible to stop when she brought up food like that, and then moved her mouth over his hand. He remembered watching her lick her lips, feeling the way she took the tips of his fingers into her mouth with a small morsel, the trust she had in him, how he’d wanted to take her back to his room to continue their meal in private.

“It feels so good to be in your hands,” she told him as she ran her own hands over her body, touching her breasts as he watched, letting her head loll to the side as she stroked her neck.

“Aww, Beel. Don’t give in yet.” Belphegor called out, sensing the pressure in Beelzebub nearing its tipping point. “Make sure to give her something good to measure me against, at least.”

The words held no sting, but he still huffed at the antagonization, and bit back a growl. Feeling her nails graze his thighs again, he concentrated on the cries he was drawing out of her instead. ‘Is it bad that she’s quieter than I am?’ She just felt so good, he couldn’t help the steady stream of appreciative sounds that left him. The way she leaned forward into him again caused his rhythm to stutter.

“I daydream non-stop about fucking you on the kitchen counter,” she said, trying to drown out Belphegor’s encouragement to edge her until she babbled. He required no pointers from Belphegor; the needy sounds he was making were enough to get her off, and the way he bounced her was beginning to cause little shock waves every time her clit hit his pubic bone. As she wrapped her arms around his neck, it became a constant pressure.

“Most of all, I love that noise you make,” she said. “I bet it means you’re close to your limit.” She pinched one of his nipples and felt him jump under her without complaint. “I’m going to drain every last drop of come out of you,” she said, promising it with the hot, open mouthed kisses she pressed to his neck. “Let me know when you’re getting close.”

“So close,” he said immediately, the words barely making it out.

“Good,” she said and a steady stream of praises filled his ear. “I don’t think I could last much longer with you filling me like this.” She clung to him. “I love sharing every inch of my body with you,” she said, clenching her thighs around him as he picked up more speed. “You’ve done such a good job of fucking me. You feel so good. I can’t wait to touch more of you again.” Her hands were all over him: nails gently dragging down his sides, pulling him in to desperate kisses, tilting his head to the side to suck at his neck. She knew now that he loved it, and could feel the way he tensed each time she spoke. His reactions built up her orgasm for her even faster than his strokes did.

“I want you to be as loud as you can when you come for me,” she said.

“Come with me. Please. Please, come with me?” he asked, nearly sobbing into her shoulder before readjusting their position so that he could lift her while still on his knees. Some of the shower struck them now, but she was too preoccupied with the way he ground his hips into her as he took a nipple into his mouth.

“Now,” she said, the tension in her almost unbearable. She didn’t think it possible, but his pace became faster after her command. There was no stopping him or her orgasm.

He plunged into her again and again, hips jerking erratically, foregoing all thought as he lost himself in her body. Feeling her clench and spasm around him only drew his completion out longer, and he moaned around her breast as he continued to release inside her well beyond what he thought he had to give. "I didn't even know it was possible to feel this good," he said, gasping into her chest.

When he sat against the wall again, he thought he’d died and gone back to the Celestial Realm. The sensation of her sliding back onto him, her cries still echoing in his ear, his come leaking out of her and flowing off of him, it was euphoric.

“You pleased me so well,” she whispered to him, even as little shocks continued to radiate through her. “Do you think you could love me one day, Beel?” she asked softly.

He held her protectively to his chest. “I already do.”

It was impossible to hold him closer, but she tried, suddenly shy and overwhelmed by his assertion. ‘It seems too fast for him to say that, but can I say I feel any differently?’ she wondered, holding tightly to the bliss found between them. She wasn’t ready for those words and kissed him instead. ‘It would be too easy to believe his comfort, and just melt into sleep right here.’

Small kisses across his face and over his neck, slowly dragged Beelzebub back to the reality of the shower. Her hands holding him were the only thing that made him this weak. The way she held him and her smile made everything else, even his hunger, disappear. He knew from the feeling of his twin’s yearning that Belphie would intrude soon, but wanted to bask in the way she held him as long as he could.

When he watched her arch and shake again, cursing as she clenched around his slowly softening cock, Beelzebub could feel the echo of his own confusion in Belphegor. He could feel her milking him once more, and it was impossible for him not to whine piteously at the overstimulation.

It was Belphegor who lifted her away, still twitching.

Beelzebub watched, and felt the confusion continue to grow in Belphegor when he kissed her softly and she clung to him, her toes curling again despite the innocent way he held her.

“Asmo’s magic?” Belphegor asked her, his voice low and accusatory.

She nodded, hiding her face in his chest. “Ah—I forgot. Fuck. I had no idea it would be this intense.” Her legs gave out and Belphegor caught her, lowering them both to their knees.

With concentration, Beelzebub could just barely sense Asmodeus’ magic in the shower with them.

Looking for any remaining marks or writing, Belphegor thoroughly swept his hands and gaze over her, turning her this way and that. He watched her writhe once more before sweeping his fingers into her dripping cunt, touching to explore and not to pleasure.

“Belphegor?” she asked, both a question and a needy cry.

A rapid pulse met his fingers against her back wall. ‘A toy has been triggered.’ He withdrew. “Nope,” he said, helping her to stand and stay standing. “Only gentle cleaning for you until it stops.” His words were quiet and firm, but the way the light flashed in his eyes was predatory. “After all, it’s not fair play if you have outside help.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another huge thank you to Dalektable for her constant diligence and keen insight. This fic would be a hodgepodge of smut and comma splices without her.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th


	72. I’m Not This Patient for Anyone But You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The twins and MC struggle with Asmodeus' interference in different ways.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another huge thank you to Dalektable for her constant diligence and keen insight. This fic would be a hodgepodge of smut and comma splices without her.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

_A rapid pulse met his fingers against her back wall. ‘A toy has been triggered.’ He withdrew. “Nope,” he said, helping her to stand and stay standing. “Only gentle cleaning for you until it stops.” His words were quiet and firm, but the way the light flashed in his eyes was predatory. “After all, it’s not fair play if you have outside help.”_

* * *

“Not a chance,” Belphegor said, continuing to deny her when she whined his name. “No coming now unless it’s me causing it.”

She kissed him before he could think to move away, desperate to lose herself with him.

“Ah-ah,” he said, pulling away. “If I have to be patient then so do you.” With her naked body wet and willing against him, it was hard to tell her no.

“I can nullify the toy,” she said, her words muffled against his chest. “ _Please_.”

“You think it’s that easy to override, Asmodeus’ magic?” he asked quietly. It was difficult to keep his resentment to himself. “He might not let you go until he wants to. You’ll be lucky if he lets you go before the hot water runs out.”

She slid her body along his, stealing the barely there friction between their skin. “It’s only programmed for one round,” she whispered, losing part of her words to a moan as her whole body tensed again.

Carefully, he held her away from himself and the relief his body could offer. “I’m sorry, Princess, you did this to yourself. No amount of pleading will make me change my mind,” he said, picking up the discarded washcloth. He soaped it again, and began washing behind her ears and over other gory spots she had missed.

“Touch me properly,” she begged. When she received no answer she tried to pull away from his hold on her wrist, and ignore the rough texture of the cloth. “Quit that!I’m already clean!”

This time he kissed her cheek, his laughter and grin easily recognizable against her skin. “I think we both know you’re filthy.”

Beelzebub watched her as she blushed and contested the accusation. The world had finally come fully back into focus and he took the moment of clarity to enjoy watching her try to pull away, even as she leaned in to every touch.

“I can help,” he said, moving towards them with an eager smile, his hands sliding once again around her middle. It was alarming how quickly she shifted into his embrace; only her wrist, still in Belphegor’s grasp, kept her from climbing him. He was paralyzed with surprise. His name on her lips again and again jarred him back to movement. “I’m here,” he said, and kissed her.

“ **Beel** ,” Belphegor said. “You can’t have her.”

“But she looks so tasty,” he said, between her ardent kisses, “and she wants my help.” The new place he’d begun marking on her neck was left in favour of warding off his twin’s glare. “Besides, if you won’t start your turn, then I’ll just have to continue mine.” Belphegor oozed his sulking across their bond, but it was easy to ignore, Beelzebub couldn’t think of anything but her in that moment.  
He kissed her back until she couldn’t stand on her own; she had never touched him or lost control like this before. He was drowning in it, in danger of toppling over with the intensity of her desire.

“Do you need her to confuse Asmodeus’ pleasure for your own?” Belphegor asked, his acerbic words were ice water over Beelzebub’s enthusiasm.

The only sound in her ears was the pounding of her blood, and all she knew was that Beelzebub was no longer touching her. His mirrored desperation fell off into gentle touches. “Beel,” she said, her eyes searching his face for explanation. “Why aren’t you helping me?”

That tiny amount of breathless pleading almost did him in. She’d wanted him before, but he’d never seen her need him like this. ‘It isn’t real though,’ he reminded himself, feeling the truth under Belphegor’s sourness. He kissed her forehead instead. “Sorry, he’s right.” The words burned his throat.

He wasn’t sure, but he thought the sound that came from her was a high pitched “no.”

“Hurry up,” Belphegor said, boredom back in his voice as he tossed Beelzebub the soap. “Hands only. I can’t trust you not to devour her.”

“You know what, I’m plenty clean. I’m just going to hop out and—”

Belphegor brought his mouth down around her nipple, following his lips with the washcloth. “Sorry, what was that?” he asked.

“Fine!” she said. Her hands moved to find her relief, only to find themselves quickly pulled away from her body. Each of the brothers held one of her hands; she glared at them both.

“None of that,” Belphegor said. He returned to soaping her up.

Beelzebub couldn’t meet her eyes, but when she tugged he didn’t let go of her hand.

“Belphie, this isn’t fair,” she said. It was too overwhelming, no longer just physical. Soft waves of magic rippled through her nerves with nothing to stop them. “ _Beel_?”

“It’s unfair that you are playing with Asmodeus without telling me.” The words were delivered softly, but Belphegor’s meaning didn’t match his tone.

“I was bewitched by Asmo the first time you kissed me! I don’t think you have any room to talk about unfairness.” A squeal escaped her, halting her tirade before it could truly start. Caught between magical sensation and two pairs of hands sliding over her was too much. She was already over sensitized, and getting close to finding her release again.

“Don’t you dare,” Belphegor said, overcoming his shock at her words, lifting his hands off of her immediately. He didn’t want to watch her orgasm from Asmodeus’ efforts. ‘Beel’s one thing, but Asmo is entirely another.’

“I don’t—I don’t think it’s meant to be resisted,” she said, panting as she stepped away from them to slump against the wall. Once again, she sucked her lips into her mouth, hiding them and the rest of the words he wouldn’t want to hear. She barely suppressed her moans; they came out instead as a low broken hum. “Stop being so stubborn! Just let me get off so I can go to sleep!” she said. ‘Fuck, it’s like arguing with Lucifer all over again.’

Belphegor didn’t touch her, moving closer, but warily as if she were a wounded animal. She could feel his disapproval, a barely there vibration in the room, too low for her to hear. Blinded by pleasure, eyes squeezed shut, she could still sense him boxing her in with his arms and body, hovering near her. She was sure he'd lowered his eyebrows the way he did when Beelzebub was eying the last candied newt leg in their after class goody bag.

“What do you mean?” Beelzebub asked carefully, an arm snaking under Belphegor to support her, instead of letting her slide down the wall. ‘Is she crying or is it water from the shower?’ he wondered, alarmed at the steady increase of her desperation.

“Mmm. It’s a shared connection,” she said, barely managing to get the words out. It wasn’t the same burning need that Asmodeus had lit in her before. She was overflowing with pleasure; touch didn’t cool her lust, and Beelzebub’s arm was just barely keeping her from drowning in it.

Belphegor stepped away from them, resting his forearms at head height on the other side of the shower, slowly and lightly thumping one of his fists against the wall as he thought. ‘Of course she was under a spell. Idiot!’

He’d been surprised when she hadn’t rebuffed his advances, elated. He’d expected many more sleepy mornings with her until she’d even look at him beyond the friend she’d made of a monster. His voice was filled with the crackle of his barely contained power. “Is that why you punished Asmodeus?”

When she didn’t answer, he turned around to look at her and saw that she’d moved off of the wall; her forehead was planted against Beelzebub’s chest, resting there and breathing heavily, writhing when she couldn’t stay still any longer. It pained him to see her like that, but it also created a tiny flicker of hope within the sea of acid eating away at his stomach. She wasn’t seeking relief from his twin.

Moving behind her, he lay his hands on her shoulders and gently rubbed. “ _Maybe_ I should be more lenient,” he said, with a sigh, tempted to pull her even to him for comfort as much as sex. “You’ve had a tough day.”

She looked over her shoulder at him and released a stuttering sigh, but didn’t move.

“Every time you answer a question for me, I will give you something more. Does that seem fair?” he asked, with a kiss to her temple.

Once she stopped quaking, she nodded her understanding.

It was difficult not to reach for her, watching her eyes close again with pleasure, but he'd seen the hesitation in her answer. It squeezed something painfully inside him. “Were you compelled when we first kissed? Were you compelled at any time at all?”

“N-no.”

Her moan of appreciation was loud as he nibbled her neck, and Belphegor caught her wrists before she could try to lay her hands on him. Releasing her back to Beelzebub’s arm, he returned to gently rubbing her circles along her shoulders and back. “Did Asmodeus’ magic affect your emotions or judgement?” he asked.

She squeezed her eyes shut again, and her body language shut him out as well; There was no hint of emotion, or nervous tells, nothing in her posture changed as she held her breath. Only Beelzebub’s hand gently stroking her hair made her move, coaxing her to breathe and think.

Belphegor resignedly kneaded her shoulders as he waited for confirmation of his spectacular mistake.

“Sort of,” she said, her tone rising in question as she tried to remember his words and organize her thoughts. “I—I accidentally converted his magic and twisted it.” Eyes still closed, her hand skated over Beelzebub’s abs, as the other still used his arm for support. “I could _turn off_ if I thought it was wrong though.”

Belphegor kissed her neck, softly, slowly, and her head immediately dropped to the side to give him greater access.

She couldn’t control the way her body thrust itself into Belphegor’s hands when they drifted over her breasts. His mouth's continued path on her neck drove away the few thoughts she’d managed to piece together.

That didn’t quite answer the question, but it was a good start. He tried to tuck away his jealousy, his anxiety taking the wheel instead, echoing uncomfortably with Beelzebub’s concern and impatience. ‘Was Beel right back when she first got “sick?” Did we take advantage of her?’

“What do you mean by wrong?” Beelzebub asked carefully, allowing himself to worry his hand over her forearms rather than the wrist she held in a vice grip. Belphegor’s apprehension was overflowing into him.

Blephegor had thought it hilarious when she’d threatened to put Asmodeus on tenterhooks, but now it was as if he were the one emotionally stretched over those hooked nails in his place. He waited for her to answer.

“Ah…If I didn’t want to lust after someone, like—like Levi—wouldn’t want—” she said into Beelzebub’s chest, her hands reaching for his shoulders. “If I was close for too long, or—Or I touched him, I blacked out.” She tried to pull Beelzebub’s arm out from between them. Beelzebub’s arm out of the way, she pressed herself flush against him for relief. It was getting hard to remember to breathe.

Belphegor’s relief was so encompassing that he missed his cue to reward her answer. It  
became a moment of compersion instead; his covetousness was overwhelmed by her reassurance, and he watched in admiration as Beelzebub kissed her deeply, letting her arms coil around his neck.

“What I’m hearing then is that you want us?” Belphegor asked.

“Yes,” she said, her answer sliding into a high pitched whine when Beelzebub’s kisses trailed away from her mouth.

“So troublesome,” Belphegor said, once again his words contrary to his tone, “but I may have a way to keep you _distracted_ for a while.” It took no effort to convince her to kneel. He knew her legs wouldn’t hold her up anymore anyway, not if Asmodeus’ level of magic was in effect. “Are you warm enough?” he asked, combing her hair away from her face.

The only thing that kept her from surging forward was his hands in her hair. She nodded, and stole additional warmth from his thighs, now under her hands.

“Good, because I don’t want you to stop until either I finish or Asmodeus does,” Belphegor said, pausing as Beelzebub’s concern threatened to smother them both. He motioned Beelzebub closer, not willing to leave him in distress.

“Let Asmodeus play tonight; I can wait to have you to myself again, but I promise I’m not this patient for anyone but you,” Belphegor said, even as he waited for Beelzebub to cozy up behind her on the floor.

She was practically swaying with need, and when she looked up at him and bit her lower lip, his forbearance crumbled. He applied the slightest pressure to her scalp before her tongue was on him, lapping at the head of his cock.

His hands thread deeper into the wet tangle of her hair just as she started to lick along his shaft and pump him with her hand. Her sense of time was lost as she pressed every sensation she felt, all of her need, into Belphegor, bobbing and swallowing around him. Only, Beelzebub’s hands at her waist kept her from moving forward and pressing Belphegor into the wall to take from him at her own frantic pace.

They’d played like this once before in her shower, but, his touch had not been nearly as sweet as it was now. Her hands took turns caressing his legs and running her nails along the plains of his stomach. Tensing with a new wave of sensation, stronger than the plateau she had been managing, she made Belphegor nearly bend over her when she hummed around him.

There was nothing except sensation for her. Her thoughts were fragmented. All that existed was the magic coursing through her, Beelzebub’s body heat around her, and the flesh and flavour under her hands and in her mouth. She was sure she was going to pop and dissipate like a smoke bubble when this was over.

Every moan she let out, Belphegor felt. It felt so good to have her hands on him finally, to feel her warmth and vigor again. Every shiver, and every gasp, belonged to him as she sucked him off. ‘I’ll make her realize how much she needs me,’ Belphegor thought. ‘How much I can love her.’ He swept hair away from her face tenderly, trying his best not to thrust forward at the rate and depth he wanted.

Even with a hand braced against the wall, it had become impossible for Belphegor to stand up straight. He wasn’t sure she was human anymore with the way her nails dug into his hips to drag his thrusts more quickly into her mouth.

“I take it back,” he said, his voice gruff. “Beel, lend her a hand and help her get off with me.” He was out of breath; she’d stolen it when she’d first grabbed his ass and swirled her tongue.

She didn’t hear Belphegor’s words, too concentrated on tasting him and dragging as much of his body against her as she could.

Just as Beelzebub reached around her hips to slowly circle her clit, she wrapped both of her hands around Belphegor’s shaft. The suction and constant flick of her tongue around his glans had him seeing stars. The pressure as she pumped him had him nearing his end quickly; He could feel her desperation as surely as his own.

“I’m about to come,” he said, expecting her to pull away, expecting her to try and avoid his increasingly vigorous thrusts. She swirled her tongue faster, dragging a low moan out of him as he shot ropes of come against the back of her throat. “That’s my girl,” he said, crooning his words as he steadied himself against the wall. “Take it all.”

For a moment, she was mindless with pleasure. The room went white, and she fell back into Beelzebub. Laying there, breathing heavily, she waited for the aftershocks that wracked her to slow.

She was still dazed, but Beelzebub tilted her head back to taste the corners of her mouth still messy with come. If he didn’t act quickly, the shower would wash it away and he’d miss his chance to relish their flavours together. Still, he was mindful of her breathing, careful to only take as many kisses as she could easily give. Pulling her more securely into his lap, he wrapped her in his arms and nuzzled into her neck. “No fainting,” he said, the soft rumble full of amusement and affection.

She wanted to thump his arm for his teasing, but couldn’t muster the energy to turn around. “It’s stopped,” she said, giving up on being anything other than boneless ever again. ‘Did that count as a foursome?’ she wondered, alternating between basking in the moment and shying away from the feeling of Beelzebub’s tongue on her neck. Realizing her eyes were closed, she opened them. “It dissipates into nothing afterwards,” she said, hoping to avoid any curious explorations in her semi-gelatinous state.

A bubble of malcontent filled Beelzebub’s chest; he nuzzled his cheek against hers. He hated the words that came out of his mouth, and whispered in her ear. “You should go to him.”

It took a moment to comprehend Beelzebub’s words, as they filtered through her hazy mind. He helped her up from her prone position and she didn’t look back to see his wistful expression. Sitting in the corner Belphegor looked bored, but she could see the intensity of his attention when his eyes would flit to her. She crawled towards him, and watched as he tried to keep his fingers from twitching.

Belphegor was elated as she approached, but then she paused. It was a short distance from one end of the shower to the other, and he watched the hot water beading and rolling off her body. Painfully, his heart thudded in his chest.

The look of confusion that she gave him had him moving towards her before she could fully extend her arm to reach for him.Carrying her back to the corner, he felt her begin to tremble in his arms. As he sat back down, he positioned her sideways in his lap, allowing her to lean away from him and into the wall.

She curled against his chest instead. “I’m sorry,” she said, gulping in air. “I don’t know why I’m shaking…” Squeezing her eyes shut disoriented her. It felt like the world was tipping. A mixture of bashful unease blanketed her.

Finding a seat at Belphegor’s side, Beelzebub lifted her feet into his lap, holding them in his hands. She didn’t protest, but her eyes met his before she turned to hide in Belphegor’s neck.

‘Did we break her?’ Belphegor tried to ask silently with only his eyebrows and pursed lips.

“She’ll be fine,” Beezelbub said aloud, enjoying the warm water, and the chance to massage her feet without competitive glares. “Neurogenic tremors.”

“You say these words like they should mean something to me,” he said, trying not to snap.  
“Shock shakes.” Beelzebub slowly worked the massage up to her ankles. “You’ve seen quaggas do it before. She’s physically shaking out everything that’s happened.”

Belphegor glanced down at her as best he could, stroking her arm before looking back to his twin.

Rolling his eyes, Beelzebub tried not to take the skepticism pushed at him personally. “Just hold her close until it stops, the warmth here will speed it along too.”

He did hold her more tightly, and the tremors intensified drastically, startling him, but they quickly dropped off when he didn’t let her support any of her own weight.

Eventually, her breathing evened out, and he rested his cheek atop her crown. Belphegor wondered if she was asleep, gently pressing against the surface of her mind. There was a tension that kept him from slipping directly into her dreams and he breathed a sigh of relief that she was not unconscious.

In one way, her stillness mollified them both, but it was difficult not to pester her and ask if she was alright. The shaking had subsided for the most part, and only returned infrequently as short shivers. Worry ate at Belphegor as he waited.

“Ugh. How embarrassing,” she said, quietly into Belphegor’s shoulder. “I’m such a mess.”

“Yes, but you’re _my_ mess,” Belphegor said, his words meant to reassure as he tried to beat down any hint of possessiveness in his tone.

A grunt of discontent met his answer. “Why would either of you want a fragile human anyway?” she asked quietly.

“You’re not just any human,” Belphegor reminded her. “Did you not like any of the reasons you’ve already heard? Or do you not believe them?”

Additional warmth against his collarbone let him know she had tried to hide at least one embarassed cheek against him. He squeezed her.

“The speed of change is just fast for me,” she said, trying her best to explain. “Human feelings can be convoluted and slow to change sometimes. Messy and indeterminate.”

“Demons and angels don’t do things in half-measures,” Beelzebub said, moving his hands further up to massage her calves, happy to have found something that melted her thoughts the way her smile did to him.

“So I’ve been told,” she said.

“You’ve never been shy to tell us off before,” Belphegor said with a sad laugh. “This shouldn’t be any different.”

Her hands coasted over the dips and muscles of his frame. “It doesn’t help that you two are squabbling over me like a new toy.” She felt Belphegor uncomfortably shift around her.

Beelzebub leaned forward to meet her suspicious expression, waving off his twin. “It’s not like that.” He watched her look upward, to the underside of Belphegor’s chin, and then back, unconvinced.

“Have I ever lied to you?”

The quick flit of her gaze up to Belphegor and back, was filled with tired suspicion.

“I said **I**.”

She inhaled deeply, drumming her fingers from pinky to pointer, while she debated whether Beelzebub could truly speak to his twin’s intentions.

It might not be wise to challenge Belphegor like this; she wasn’t even sure she had the energy to test his sincerity, but he seemed to let his actions do all of the talking for him. Her hand stilled its tapping. “I take it you two won’t give up on your terrible idea of pursuing me any time soon?” she asked.

Beelzebub shook his head, while Belphegor spoke for them, “Not a chance.”

‘If he can keep from taunting Beelzebub, then maybe I’m not a piece of rope for their tug-of-war,’ she thought. Leaning away from his chest, she watched his eyes, waiting for the violet to bleed into the pink she associated with Belphegor’s fiendishness. “Show me how you want me then.”


	73. I Told You So

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC Test's Belphegor's Motives

_‘If he can keep from taunting Beelzebub, then maybe I’m not a piece of rope for their tug-of-war,’ she thought. Leaning away from his chest, she watched his eyes, waiting for the violet to bleed into the pink she associated with Belphegor’s fiendishness. “Show me how you want me then.”_

The pink was still there amongst the violet in Belphegor’s eyes, but it lacked the usual fire she’d come to expect.

“I want to do more than just show you with a kiss—a lot more. I want to know you more intimately than anyone ever has,” he said, and brought his mouth down to hers slowly, still cradling her naked form in his arms. 

There was nothing tentative about the way he moved his lips against hers, but it was unexpectedly tender. It reminded her of how he’d teased and fucked her against the rough, stone wall of her bedroom, only to lay her down and softly kiss her on the bed. A middle ground was not something he had; She could see a switch had flipped in him. “I’m not made of glass,” she said, trying to remind him, and make him forget her earlier tremors. 

“Close your eyes,” he said, dipping her low to lay her across the shower floor in front of him. “Lean back.” He revelled in how she moved for him without question.

Belphegor wrapped her legs, finally stolen away from Beelzebub’s hands, loosely around his waist, docking her hips in his lap. “Feel my fingers trace the shape of your face,” he said, stretching over her to reach. Gentle sounds of appreciation fell from her lips, breathing life and heat back into the embers of his desire.

The pads of his fingertips barely touched her, sometimes only disturbing the water that pooled on her skin, and she felt herself falling under his spell, felt herself wanting to fall under it. 

“Your lips.” He swept over them, feeling them open easily. ‘So vicious when they cut someone down, and yet so sweet when you smile.’ His urge to kiss them was difficult to quell.

“Your neck,” he said, tracing downward. “Perfect for my mouth.”

“Feel every hint of my touch,” he said, guiding her senses further down, reminding her how the sensation of tile at her back and water sliding off her, were nothing compared to his hands, or the way he pressed against her with her legs locked around him.

She felt his breath, moving over her much too slowly, but she couldn’t find it in herself to be impatient when he made her feel like she was beautiful and wanted. The touch that ghosted over her was soothing and enthralling. It felt like she was floating. A peek to her left and she saw Beelzebub watching them, his hands gripping his thigh as he licked his lips. She wanted to fall deeper into sensation until even Beelzebub’s eyes on her were forgettable. 

Rocking against Belphegor, she tried to press into his feather-light touches. Her small sighs grew into louder sounds of want, that she tried to suppress behind her hands. 

“I want you thinking of me. I want your eyes only on me,” he said, the strokes of his hands along her body growing bolder and less gentle to match the decibel of her needy whimpering. “I want your hands on me. I want all of you.”

She captured him in her arms, pulling him closer to hold him over her, kissing his neck and derailing how softly he was trying to love her. As much as she appreciated his thoroughness, it was infuriatingly slow.

Holding his weight on his forearms, he held himself in place, enjoying how she clung to him. “You’ve made a terrible trespass, Princess. You’ve woken the Lord of Sloth,” he said, ducking closer to mouth his words against her throat. “Be mine, Princess. Only mine. Let me love and protect every inch of you.”

It wasn’t fair how his words made her fall apart, and need him closer. She raised her hips and kissed him, pressing him into her wet heat with a flex of her legs while he was distracted by her tongue. ‘I can’t promise him anything if this is just rivalry,’ she thought, even as the tightness in her chest and throat disagreed viciously. ‘I can’t say it to anyone without bringing the house down around us.’

“Tell me how much you like it when I make love to you,” he said, holding her gaze to his when she remained silent.

“I love whenever you’re inside me,” she said, trying to rock his body with her own as he held still inside of her, steadfastly refusing to move.

Belphegor could feel her repeatedly tensing around his cock, the sensation growing stronger and faster as he lowered himself to kiss her breasts. It was beautiful the way she arched under him whenever he took a nipple into his mouth. It only made him want to touch more of her, and to use her arms to pull her further on to him.

“Do you know why I don’t mind that Beel fucks you before me?” he asked her, sitting up and withdrawing, only to press back into her with an aching slowness.

Her ‘no’ was lost in a gasp when his thumb circled her clit. She shouldn’t feel so stupidly pleased that he didn’t mind. It shouldn’t have to be a victory that she celebrated.

“I don’t mind because it means you’re already sopping wet and ready for me when I want to fuck you roughly,” he said, grabbing her waist and tilting her hips so that her ass was flush against him. He withdrew and snapped his hips to hers harshly. The sound of him driving into her grew louder, and more lewd, as he moved faster. “I don’t mind because it means the marks I leave on you will stay there.” 

“Yes!” she heard herself chanting. Her words, breaking with the force of his movements were quickly becoming unintelligible, and her mind stuttered in favour of pleasure. She didn’t even care that he was beginning to slide them along the shower floor with the force of his thrusts.

Her cries only egged him on, encouraging him to move faster and rougher than before. “My precious princess, I want to fuck you so deep into subspace that all you can do is whimper and whine incoherently as I ruin you and feed you sweet praises until you tremble under every touch of mine.”

Stopping abruptly, he pulled out of her, and she growled in frustration, striking the floor at her side with her fist. He was infuriating and intoxicating when he teased her and touched her just to press her buttons. She had been so close, but instead of feeling sad at the loss, she reached for him.

He loved that she had gravitated to him immediately. Without a word, he scooped her up into his arms and stood. Moving towards the nearest wall, Belphegor glanced back at his twin to find him transfixed by the scene unfolding before him. He could feel the well of excitement and longing there, outside of his own, while her mouth moved over his neck and collarbone, kissing and biting in equal measure.

Pressing back inside her, he savoured the feeling as she arched away from the cold wall. “You sound so good,” he said, slowing the rate he raised and lowered her, dragging every moment and every moan out of her. “That’s it. Let me hear what I do to you. Just for me.”

Her eyelashes fluttered as she struggled to keep her eyes open, and her awareness of everything around them began to fade. There was nothing but their breath, hot and mingled. Every time he lifted her up he left her, only for all of her want, and teeth, and need, to fall back onto him. 

The tiny distance between their lips was enough to drive her mad, even with him filling her. Hungry for him in every way, her hands moved over his shoulders and back, trying to pull him closer, although there was already no space between them.

“Belphie?” she asked, barely aware of need over sensation.

“Yes, Princess?”

“Can—can I have Beel instead?” she asked, her words mumbled. 

His rhythm slowed until he was motionless. The pain hadn’t yet registered within his heart, but the shock froze his thrusts, and his mouth opened silently. 

She opened her eyes completely when she felt the tips of her toes touch the floor and their movement petered out to nothing. “He’s much warmer than the wall,” she said once she saw his face, realizing the error of her thoughtless words. 

Hugging her tightly to him, Belphegor laughed into her neck before finally kissing her. “You are going to give me a heart attack one day,” he said, but he couldn’t keep the smile from his face. “Beel, come here, she wants you to be a warm wall for her.”

There had been a hundred different ways that Belphegor could have responded. He was the champion of making assumptions, but he had waited to hear more from her and she poured her elation into kissing him when he showed her the smile he always hid. 

“I coddle you far too much,” he said as he sandwiched her between them and raised one of her legs high up on his hip. The way she nodded mutely and tried to wiggle and rock against him was indication enough for him to continue.

She relished the pressure of them surrounding her and occupying her mind.

As Beelzebub gently stroked her sides, keeping her away from the cold wall with his body, it was Belphegor’s growl that rolled through her and heated her from the inside. His sound was playful and primal, painting her world with the sensation of cuddling naked and safe under blankets during a violent thunderstorm. It was impossible not to cling to him.

Never had she been so tired but so turned on and zealously dedicated to a moment of intimacy. She might never move again after this, but it was impossible not to respond enthusiastically. The closeness she felt with them built a warmth in her chest that continued to grow, and she found herself climbing higher, ready to fall apart between them. 

"Do you want me to stop, Princess? You’re whimpering,” Belphegor asked, moving faster.

She squared up her hips and met him thrust for thrust as best she could. “No, please don't stop,” she said, her words catching in her throat. She hadn’t known just how much she wanted their love until today. They were here, washing away all of her pain. Replacing it instead with something tender as they showed her how cherished she was.

“My cock loving fuckdoll,” he said, abandoning his attack on her neck to kiss her fiercely again. 

His words were terrible and offensive; they created a visceral reaction in her, but the way he said them was soft and beautiful and melted her at the same time. It made her want to spread her legs even wider for him. ‘How can something that sounds so awful make me feel like he loves me?’ she wondered, as she began to drown again in the fervor of his mouth on hers. 

Beelzebub tried his best not to wrap his arms around them. The idea of holding her and not letting her go was becoming more and more difficult to push away. It would be perfect to nibble at her neck then pick her up to help her rise and fall on his twin. He shivered under the press of bodies against him, imagining her taking them both at once. 

Watching her embrace Belphegor while he rutted her up against him had Beelzebub trying to remember history class lessons and unappetizing meals to keep himself composed. This was Belphegor’s turn; he shouldn’t interfere. He breathed deeply, his hands itching to touch more of her as her body constantly skated over his.

“Why would you ever make me choose?” she asked when Belphegor let her breathe her own air again. “Please don’t make me choose; I’d never be able to come between you two other than like this.”

Beelzebub’s hands were on her without further thought, sliding over her thighs and teasing her breasts.

“Twice as greedy as I thought then,” Belphegor said. 

“Please come in me?” 

His thrusts lost their steady rhythm at her words. He could feel Beelzebub’s triumphant smile without looking. The echoing swell of happiness, alongside her begging, was enough to tip Belphegor over the edge once more. He kissed her savagely, and circled her clit with his thumb, forcing her to come with him again. He didn’t care if she was tired; she was finally theirs.

“This is one of the very rare occasions where I get to tell you ‘I told you so,’” Beelzebub said as he wrapped his arms around the two of them as best he could.

Belphegor rested his head against his twin’s shoulder, his words rough and broken, “I never thought I’d be happy to hear you say that, Beel.” 

She was squished between them, but this was by far one of the best afterglows she'd ever experienced. It didn’t matter that Belphegor had barely lowered her leg; for the moment, everything felt right. If she weren’t starving, she would refuse to move at all. 

“Beel?” she asked sleepily, not waiting for his response. “Is there anywhere that delivers tacos at this hour?”

His stomach groaned noisily behind her. “I don’t think I can ever let you leave my side now.”

Blushing, and still trying to catch her breath, she nuzzled her cheek against Belphegor’s chest. It was hard to process, that they both really meant it, that they’d want a magic-less human. “We should get out soon before Beelzebub actually does eat me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you again to Dalektable for her help in editing this chapter <3 And for all of you for sitting through three chapters of shower smut.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th


	74. Duty Calls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of time to see how Mammon and Asmodeus have been faring during all of this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your patience, and of course a big thank you to Dalektable for her constant C.C.
> 
> I'm going to try to move to posting on Monday mornings as that will work better with my new night schedule at work and give Dalektable a bit more time to pull out her hair and eat her red pen in consternation as she reads my rough drafts.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

Mammon paced the front hall, wings and tail twitching. Tapping his hands against his thighs, he paused to check his D.D.D. and double checked again that the sound was turned on.

Not long ago, he’d followed Satan up to the makeshift medical room with his arms filled with potions. ‘Satan at least hadn’t failed her. He was once a part of Lucifer, how could he have done otherwise?’ The least he could do was open the door to her room for him.

Swallowing hard, with his hand on the door knob, he had opened it, not receiving so much as a backward glance. Not even Belphegor had acknowledged Mammon’s presence as he stared in at them while they worked feverishly to save her. If only the knots inside him would losen, he might’ve been able to stand up straight, maybe even able to think clearly enough to help.

He’d squeezed his eyes shut against the scene before him. There’d been no time to take in her injuries before; the lights and sound had distracted him from all of her injuries, but all of it was before him now: Her shoes and dress strewn across the rugs, her comforter as filthy with clotted blood as she was, corks and vials littering the floor. She had looked like a broken doll.

With Belphegor’s hand in hers, she shouldn’t have been conscious, and as Mammon watched his self loathing had continued to grow with every inch she tried to move away from Beelzebub’s glowing hands. Equal measures of confused joy and pain had taken turns burning his throat as he’d watched her struggle to bend and roll away, dying but not yet dead. Mammon had continued to stare blankly, stuck in looping thoughts of dread and memory, until he heard Belphegor trying to coax her into slumber.

There was no way to tell how long he’d stood there, gripping the doorknob as knots had begun squeezing his stomach with returning fear. When Satan’s voice shook with emotion, Mammon had closed the door, and left to patrol the hall once more, to await orders, anything but having to watch her shake and groan in her suffering.

‘Who do you think you are, stupid human?’ That was the first thing he’d said to her, and every day since she’d worn him down, ingratiating herself into his heart until he couldn’t breath without knowing where she was.

“How did I fuck this up so badly?” he asked. The lonely echo from the front hall was the only one to answer him.

He tried calling Asmodeus again. No answer, though that wasn’t surprising given the venue. ‘Why hasn’t Lucifer called?’ Diavolo anger had always been immediately served hot, or chilled with decades of planning. ‘The sour old rat has no reason not to call!’ The guilt was eating at Mammon from both sides of his heart. He’d failed both his human and his commander, and it was the two of them who were paying the price for it.

Walking up the stairway swiftly, he paused on the top step before forcing himself onward, back to her door. He hesitated, remembering what he’d last seen when he’d opened it. Would she be awake still? Would he have to face her? Plodding slowly, he made his way back to the front door. ‘What if—what if these are her last moments? Shouldn’t I be there?’

At the sound of a loud pop and crackle, Mammon started and turned sharply, searching for the source of the sound. He found only the fire in the great hall; his shoulders and wings drooped. Mammon wasn’t even sure of what he’d hoped to find. He leaned against the wall, looking up at the imposing gargoyle.

‘I shouldn’t go up there. The last thing she needs is to console me with her last breaths. Again. Selfish. So fucking selfish. She deserves better.’

Sliding down the wall, he could imagine her admonishing him: _Idiot. Humans aren’t so weak. Stop treating me like I’ll break from just this. Don’t underestimate me!_

His chest hurt even thinking about it. She was always so full of life. She’d be furious if she knew he thought she was going to throw in the towel, probably stay alive just out of spite. Tapping the edge of his D.D.D. against his chest, he continued to debate whether to run up the stairs again or not. He wanted to hear her say her nickname for him again.

‘But wouldn’t I just be in the way?’

When his D.D.D. finally buzzed to life, his shaking hands fumbled to unlock it. The terror that Belphegor’s name on the screen elicited in him was complete. He couldn't fight the future, couldn't stop it any more than he could summon the sun to the Devildom. Closing his eyes and steeling himself, he tapped the screen and opened the message.

He fell forward onto his knees, wing tips dragging across the floor with each shuddering breath he took.

* * *

**72 Chat (2):**

**Belphie:** Beel says she’ll live. It was a close thing though.

 **Belphie:** Might not’ve if Satan hadn’t shown up with an apothecary’s worth of phials.

 **TheGreatMammon:** Should I come see her?

 **Belphie:** Not any time soon. Just finished stopping the internal bleeding and reshaping her ribs.

 **Belphie:** Beel’s taking a food break. Hasn’t been able to put her leg back in its socket yet or deal with the breaks.

* * *

The instant relief Mammon felt when Belphegor told him not to go to them made him sick to his stomach with shame. He was better than that, wasn’t he?

* * *

**TheGreatMammon:** But she’s gonna be okay?

 **Belphie:** …

 **Belphie:** It might take a while, but yeah, I think so.

 **TheGreatMammon:** You think so?!

 **Belphie:** When does she ever do anything the normal way? Don’t ask me to guess at that.

 **TheGreatMammon:** I can’t relax if ya make me wait for this long.

 **Belphie:** I’ll message you when it’s safe to come back.

 **Belphie:** If it makes you feel any better she already made fun of Lucifer.

 **TheGreatMammon:** That’s my human!

 **Belphie:** We should talk after this.

* * *

He could only imagine what Belphegor wanted to talk to him about. Every possible way Belphegor could tear him down after this would be deserved. He’d failed her and put her life in danger because of what, a bit of discomfort?

‘Leviathan,’ he thought, spurring himself into walking up the stairs.

Mammon rapidly tapped a message out to the eldest as he walked. This was a discussion that would need to happen face to face if he wanted to ensure she wasn’t accidentally drowned in Leviathan’s distress.

‘Will she look at me the same way when she wakes up?’ he wondered. ‘Do I want her to?’

As much as he wanted to crawl into her bed next to her, he couldn’t quell the revulsion that his stomach squeezed up into his throat at the thought of her trying to forgive him. He hadn’t just run from her at The Fall, he’d left her side when he’d brought her home, and again after delivering Satan to her door. ‘Scum.’

  
Shaking his head free from the thoughts didn’t help, the phantom sound of her heartbeat was haunting him despite her survival. ‘I don’t deserve forgiveness,’ he thought, remembering how it felt when her fingers would interlock with his, how she had snuggled into his shirt almost every night. ‘Coward.’ The ghost of those sensations stole his breath. He’d give almost anything to be able to tell her how he felt about her right now, but talking with Leviathan came first. This time her safety came first.

  
He dried his eyes, clenching and unclenching his fists, as he stood outside Leviathan’s door, unsure of exactly how long he’d been standing there.

Opening the door without knocking, he watched as Leviathan turned toward the open door. He was frowning, an insult ready on his tongue, but Mammon saw how quickly his brows knit together in concern as he tore his headphones down and off.

Mammon’s voice didn’t falter. “Leviathan, Third Lord of The Devildom, Grand Admiral of Hell’s Navy, report for duty.”

* * *

On the fifth floor of The Fall, Asmodeus was situated comfortably between two demonesses, their tails tangling behind him on the leather settee and their arms across him. The music was loud and the room thick with purple smoke.

“Mammon!” he cried out, seeing his brother through the haze. “Come join us! We’re celebrating me! I didn’t know, but this is the hundredth anniversary of my patronage here~”

“Mammon?” Asmodeus asked, taking in Mammon’s distractedness, even as the party continued going on around them. Gold balloons erupted from a cake behind him. “Mammon?”

He was gone as quickly as he’d arrived.

The air around them combusted, showering the party-goers in purple and gold sparks and clearing the room of smoke for a few minutes. ‘The reverberation of the bang is quite nice,’ he thought, as he snapped a photo of the cascading fireworks and dazzled crowd. ‘Oh well, Mammon must’ve thought the human wouldn’t enjoy the explosions. She does startle easily.’

His goal was 100 images for 100 years of partying and passion; he had a lot of poses to get through tonight. “Another round of drinks for everyone!” he shouted, and a roar of approval filled the private lounge. A small trickle of lust rippled out of him, and into the room, not that it needed it. Already the party was starting to pick up without his help.

Twenty pictures later, an intense euphoria and longing rolled through him, tightening his pants uncomfortably. His shudder went unnoticed and he licked at his lips. ‘What in the three realms is that woman up to?’ he wondered, not for the first time since he’d left her downstairs.

He breathed through another spasm of magic. It was powerful, but it faded quickly as had been happening on and off throughout the night. Dancing together had been wonderful, feeling the mimic of her every movement as if she already held him tightly inside her. He’d almost lost his balance when she’d danced with Mammon. ‘A shame Mammon still refuses to sleep with me— _oh my_ , something must be flustering her greatly,’ he thought as he brought his glass up to clink with another. ‘The picture of that cheers was just gorgeous; the gold of the drink perfectly accentuates my hair colour. Definitely posting this one.’

It was so easy to luxuriate in the frisson and music as bodies slid against one another with ease and rhythm. Time always got away from him here; Inara had posed with him as he cut the tiered cake she’d made for the occasion, the balloons had been used for lascivious purposes already, and they were still waiting on the next delivery of bottles. Yet he found himself falling out of the vibe, watching everyone around him indulging instead of participating in full.

The human kept invading his mind. It wasn’t even when the cock ring would twitch and sensate with her linked arousal. It was in the dead silence of its existence around him too. He’d find himself making quips and working the room, but unable to enjoy the devotion before him, thinking, instead, about her and the lack of her.

  
This party was all for him, as only he deserved. So why wasn’t he enjoying it?  
Sloppily kissing his newest neighbour on the settee, he considered the effects of intimacy, as he stared into their eyes, fanning their lust with the false closeness.

  
Soft echoes of pleasure and magic welled from the linked device, weighing him down as if it was her in his lap, and he almost cursed. It unsettled him, throwing his thoughts back to her and how their intimacy only existed with all of their clothing still on.  
A hand sliding along his cheek reminded him of where their human had left a kiss there, after she’d returned from her date with Beelzebub. No one could convince him that it wasn’t a date.

  
Soft lips at his neck reminded him of how she hid in the crook of his shoulder and neck when she was embarrassed. The gasps around him brought a vision of her shocked indignation, inhaling deeply, and ready to fight Satan over a perceived slight to his character.

  
He’d kissed her before, although it was nothing like tonight’s endeavours: perfect demonic synchronicity, honed to tempt. With her it had been heated and deep, or simple and sweet.

  
The drink in his glass seemed stale now.

  
Another set of magical waves exerted its power over him, shooting lightning down his spine, and he drained his drink anyway, letting himself be tortured with his own power.

  
‘She denies lust so readily, but still accepts my toys and seeks sanctuary in my arms,’ he thought, on edge despite the ease with which his tail slid up the leg of his neighbour’s neighbour.

  
Soon, she would need to rest. That’s when he would go to her. The glass in his hand broke with the next rolling wave of pleasure. The sets were getting closer together.

  
“Opa!” he shouted with a practiced smile. The shards of glass, sparkling in the air as he tossed them behind himself, would make another spectacular photo for Devilgram.

  
‘That dress was the right choice,’ he thought, sighing. ‘If it weren’t for the chastity magic in it I would have dragged her into a private room the moment Mammon left the dance floor.’

  
He pulled out his D.D.D. even though he knew she wouldn’t see his messages until they were on their way home. ‘All the better,’ he thought. ‘Let her read them once she’s already flushed and breathless from dancing, while Mammon is trying not to look like he’s squeezing her for his comfort.’

* * *

**Lustationship Chat (2):**  
**23:42**

**AsmoBaby:** You were so cute out there on the dance floor. I could just eat you out.  
**AsmoBaby:** I meant up.

 **23:45**  
**AsmoBaby:** No, I didn't.

Asmodeus cringed. When did the Avatar of Lust get this pathetic? Probably, when he’d started hoping she was looking at him while he was looking away.

Would she know he was serious with such a terrible line? Would she bat it away like all the other more carefully crafted and well executed bids he’d made? He sighed and began typing again. Better to play it off as a bad joke.

 **23:46**  
**AsmoBaby:** T **h** is is **a ve** ry **s** erious t **ex** t **with** no hidden **me** aning.

* * *

The D.D.D. dropped out of his hands with the force of the pleasure that pulsed through his body. It continued to build quickly, and he was nearly dropped by it. Bodies writhed around him on the settee and floor, oblivious to him other than the heavy waves of lust that now rolled off of him, getting them drunk on his power.  
‘That was unexpected,’ he thought as an ebb in the flow of concentrated ecstacy returned some clarity to his mind.

He beckoned over a wood nymph. Erato was no stranger to him; she would often seek him out here in the wee hours of the morning. The warm, burnished pine contours of her body were beautiful, always pliant and needy for him. He’d become a portion of her addiction, one of the few reasons she still journeyed down to visit the Devildom he was sure.

‘I think I should allow myself to be a little bit of a whore, as a treat!’ he thought. It wasn’t fair that his mistress was having all the fun.

“Come sit on my lap, kitten,” he said and she poured herself onto him without hesitation, her movements practiced through habit.

Glancing around, his cheering squad and adoring fans had already swooned from pleasure, or found more private rooms for their amorous activities. He was letting loose a bit more than usual, but there was no reining it in now.

“Already?” she asked. “The night is still young.”

“Playing coy?” He pitched his voice as soft music in her ear.

She always had a one track mind, searching for powerful prey to sooth her fixation; tonight, the only difference was that he wanted her just as much.

Her answer was warm like the heated rocks of the Acacesian mountains where he’d first tasted her. “I wouldn’t dream of it. You know I love it when you surprise me with a quickie.”

Another wave of shuddering pulses from the device washed through him, and his head fell back against the settee frame. His hands on her hips, grinding her against his trapped erection, he rode each wave with her until she was panting, and whimpering loudly.

They kissed deliriously. The sky could have rained fire and Asmodeus wouldn't have known it.

She pulled away and slid down his body, to her knees, taking his zipper down with her. The sensation of her nails on his exposed thighs felt like nothing against the backdrop of constant delirium and excitement emanating from the device, from his mistress.

‘I might’ve accidentally cursed myself,’ he thought. The sensations were all too similar to the morning he’d been released from self-chastity. ‘It felt so much like this when she was writhing under me.’

He tried to focus on the nymph in front of him.

Erato always insisted on starting this way; running her tongue over his shaft was the foreplay she demanded before he would spread her legs and finish inside her tight body. She wanted to be on her knees at the church of seed, she had told him once, a religion of service and hunger.

‘It’s better this way, isn’t it?’ he asked himself, his moans only nourishing Erota’s want. She sucked with a thirst beyond water, swallowing around him with relish. He felt her hunger and would feed her deeply.

‘If I touch my mistress, with my grip this tight, I might break her, might go beyond what she can manage,’ he thought, as his hands guided Pan’s priestess more roughly over him. This would have to do for now, until he could spend himself at least a few more times. Besides, who was he to deny a horny dryad?

Erota was beautiful, yes, but he wanted something else. Something sweeter, kinder. After this, he would have to find his mistress, and see who it was who had brought her to such heights. He remembered Bacchic rituals with less enthusiasm.

‘I hope she made Mammon jealous.’ The thought was too good to waste, and he revelled in the feeling of Erota’s tongue while imagining his mistress selfishly finding her release in the unlit halls while Mammon watched from the shadows.

About to pull her off of himself and find his way under her clothing, the door shook with a rap as polite as a battering ram.

The rhythmic knocking at the door jarred him from his fantasy. When had the music stopped? Only the sound of his heavy breathing and Erota’s groan of dissatisfaction filled the room.

Barbatos’ voice could easily be heard through the door. “Lord Asmodeus, Prince Diavolo has incited a Wild Hunt. Please report to the first floor for instruction.”

There were no additional instructions or sounds, not even of footsteps to indicate Barbatos retreating on the other side... Asmodeus licked his lips, dragging his tongue over his teeth in frustration. “Coming!” he called out.

Erota took it as a challenge, and he came quickly and silently under her skilled attentions.

With a gentle kiss of apology, he zipped his pants, and left her there on her knees. She would understand. Duty called.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those interested, we will be venturing into the class systems of celestials, spirits, gods, nymphs, demons, devils, imps...etc. and who holds sway over them in future chapters.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th


	75. Interruptions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our poor MC just wants to sleep, but the universe is never kind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another massive thank you to Dalektable for her invaluable editing expertise and recommendations.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

Looking at the bloody mess around her room, she ignored the evidence of violence and made straight for her bed. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d left bloody clothing on her floor, although usually there was much, much less blood. She would clean it up tomorrow.

She knew the crumpled blanket in the bathroom had been on her bed, but Beelzebub was already laying down on it; he would be her warmth instead. Her shirtless, delectable, definitely going commando furnace.

Limbs heavy and eyelids drooping, she readily dozed against him once she’d settled in. She wondered briefly how Asmodeus managed to survive, unsure of how he kept solid form with energy like his always bursting to escape. He was a different kind of monster than she’d expected.

A loud crunch drew her attention up and away from her semi-sleep. On his side, over her, Beelzebub was eating chips. In. Her. Bed.

“No chips in bed,” she said, attempting to shove the wall of muscle off the side of the mattress. He didn’t budge, but did eat more carefully. The soft vibration he sounded from within his chest made its way through her hands, dipping her further into drowsiness. Rolling over, she closed her eyes, content to be a sleepy little spoon.

Chips weren’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things. The long, white nightie she wore wasn’t her usual go to, but if it would shield her from chip crumbs, then it was welcome around her any day of the week. And it was probably best to be wearing something in case Mammon came to bed. She wondered if she should message him, but remembered that he still had her phone.

An “eeep!” left her as she was tugged back to the other side of the bed. Belphegor had climbed in and immediately pulled her against him, tucking her under his chin.

Her breath tickled at his neck, and he heard her grumble when he reverted to a more humanoid form. It didn’t stop her hands from roaming, but he could tell she was moving without intent to arouse. Sleepy touches. He didn’t regret leaving his shirt on the floor.

“Much better,” he said, looking directly at Beelzebub. Sharing would be more interesting, but in his mind the competition wasn’t at an end. He’d make sure to fuck her more thoroughly than Beelzebub, until she’d never be able to fall sleep without his lips on her first.

Catching Beelzebub’s attention with a slight nod, Belphegor began their slow and silent communication, muddling through one another’s emotions. When Beelzebub glanced towards the door, Belphegor felt calmer, broadcasting it as loudly as he could without a growl. He waited until eventually Beelzebub looked to the door and then the direction of their room. A smile slipped out without his permission, and Belphegor nuzzled his cheek against her hair. He tried to transmit what it felt like to hold her.

It was just as Beelzebub nodded his agreement that the human in his arms began to move, attempting to roll over. Deciding to humour her and move with her instead of barring her with his embrace, Belphegor pushed himself up to frame her from above.

The way she still blushed under him at such a small thing was irresistible. He captured her lips with his, and then watched her blush grow deeper. A sleepy smile overtook him, and he dipped again to kiss her.

He watched as Beelzebub’s arm slid across the width of the wide bed to take her hand in his. Seeing her blush remain, even as Beelzebub’s hold relaxed her back to the cusp of sleep, was something he would hold onto.

Her gaze redirected, Belphegor slid his knee between her legs lazily and watched her eyes snap open and back to him. It was endlessly amusing to him that she couldn’t see the patterns on her clothing. This particularly sweet and girly nightdress was not to his taste, but the way it darkened over the warmest sections of her body was mouth watering. He could watch her covered skin heat every time his hand skimmed down her body, and he wondered how many designs he could coax from her before the entire dress was black.

Distracted by his own thoughts, as his hand traced down to her hip, he didn’t notice Beelzebub’s approach until he was close enough to steal her kisses out from under him. He held back the urge to click his tongue and instead leaned down to her exposed neck and ear, not to be outdone so soon.

His knee still between thighs, one hand at her waist, and his mouth at her ear, he could already feel her body heating once more.

“You’re my good little whore,” Belphegor said, growling the words in the Infernal language as well. Her body arched off of the bed towards him and her kiss with Beelzebub went from sweet to urgent.

He kissed her cheek when Beelzebub pulled away to breathe. “I love how responsive you are for me,” Belphegor whispered to her. “I look forward to playing with you more.” He stole a kiss to her other cheek. She would be his to punish and pleasure. “But more importantly, I will always protect you. I promise.”

Closing his eyes while he kissed her, he tried to block out the memory of her ribs cracking in his once deadly embrace. He wouldn’t let anything like that ever happen again.

It should have been perfect. She would have fallen asleep between them before they took her back to their room, but his eyes still closed, Belphegor heard the door open, and felt his twin shift upright on the bed.

“Belphegor,” Mammon said tightly, his voice a higher tone of anger than what Belphegor could remember hearing from him before. “Outside. Now.”

Resting his forehead against hers, he sighed before moving his hand from her waist to cup her cheek. “I’ll take care of everything, you know that, right?”

The faintest stirrings of Mammon’s power whispered through the room, and Belphegor kissed her gently once more before getting up. With a quick glance to Beelzebub, he walked to her door shirtless and barefoot, stepped past Mammon, and disappeared.

Mammon had remained rigid, staring at the stone wall over her head while he waited. His toe didn't tap in impatience. His arms weren’t crossed. He was eerily quiet and still, with his fists at his sides. It wasn’t until Belphegor walked past him that he looked down and then turned away, never once meeting her eyes.

She moved to follow them, but Beelzebub didn’t let go of their entwined fingers, his other hand coming down on her shoulder, to stop her from rolling out of the bed. “Why is Leviathan the least jealous one here?” she whispered angrily to herself. She rolled back towards Beelzebub to press her face into the mattress.

Smooshing her cheek against the bed, she looked over at the open door and considered making a break for it, but dismissed the notion quickly; Beel would catch her by the time she got both feet on the floor.’ Head back down into the sheets she huffed, and shook his hand away to bring both of hers over her head protectively.

“Are you alright?” Beelzebub asked hesitantly.

“Yes, just hold on. I need more time to overthink things.” She could feel him watching as her legs bent at the knees only to drop back down heavily while she sighed in defeat.

“It’ll be alright.”

She turned to face him. “Why won’t you let me go after them?” she asked, too tired for anything but bluntness.

“You’ll get hurt,” he said, looking at his hands as he massaged one with the other, “and Belphie didn’t want you to go.”

It felt wrong glaring at Beelzebub, but she couldn’t help it. “That’s not his decision to make.”

“You don’t trust him?” he asked, tilting his head to the side.

Her shoulders slumped as she lost some of her irritation. “What does that have to do with anything? They’re being idiots.”

“You should at least trust him to keep you safe,” Beelzebub said, his hand reaching for one of hers again.

“Beel, I’m sure you can tell I’ve been working on the whole trust thing, but I can’t just sit here while they—ugh! You know what, I don’t even know what they’re going to do, but I know it isn’t good.”

“They’re just going to…” Beelzebub paused for a moment, “have a struggle snuggle.”

It was impossible not to gawp at the phrase Belphegor had taught his twin. “I’m not smiling because I want to,” she said, shaking her head slowly, still surprised that the term had come out of her sweet Beelzebub’s mouth. “That doesn’t mean what you think it means.” She blinked away the ridiculousness of having to explain that one. It could wait for another day. One problem at a time.

“I asked one thing of Mammon when I told him about being with you. Just one! ‘Don’t beat up or try to beat up your brothers.’ How hard is that?” She sat up abruptly, chaffing to leave the room, “I just don’t understand. He seemed to get over it at least somewhat when I told him I’d been with you. I don’t see how this is so different.”

Beelzebub’s expression shifted rapidly from pleased to thoughtful, but he didn’t offer any insight. “Mammon won’t irreversibly hurt Belphie, and he’s never lost control before,” he said, stroking his thumb over the back of her hand. “That’s why he was assigned to guard you. He’s always had the best control. Even more than Lucifer.”

That did make some sense. Other than Asmodeus, every single one of them had lost their cool and tried to harm her at one point or another. Only Mammon had never come close, except—

“Beel! Beel, that’s not true. He lost control today.”

“To be fair, you were very hurt. It’s understandable if—”

“No, Beel, before I left! He lost his cool and pinned me twice,” she said. “I actually had to _command_ him to stop.” She inadvertently looked at the floor, and the place against the wall where he had held her. ‘This isn’t good. This isn’t good at all. I need to find a way to stop them and not get squished. Why can’t demons just talk things out, damn it!’

Beelzebub sat up as well, and pulled her into his lap, her back against his chest, pressing his mouth against the top of her head. “We can deal with that later and Belphie will be fine.”

It was hard to believe him when his hands were worrying carefully around her biceps, instead of being wrung together as he usually did.

The entire room shook and rattled as a loud boom sounded against the side of the building.

“Let’s get you down to the crypt; it sounds like they’re starting with warning shots,” Beelzebub said.

“The crypt?” she asked, uncurling from the ball she’d made of herself at the noise.

“It’ll be safer down there in case things get a little heated.”

She thought it already sounded heated, but crammed her inner hissy fit down before continuing that line of thought. It wasn’t helpful.

“Okay.”

“Okay?” he asked.

“Let me get my robe and we’ll go downstairs. I don’t feel up for more bleeding to death today.” She stood carefully and collected her slippers and robe while she waited for Beelzebub to finish typing on his D.D.D. Time was all she needed to sort this out. She wasn’t sure how yet, but she knew time, and sleep, were necessary ingredients.

A sigh escaped her when she caught herself wishing that Lucifer were home.

Having finished sending his messages, Beelzebub took her hand in his and walked with her out into the hall. She still jumped whenever a blast would buffet the house and he would squeeze her hand in response.

“Are you going to be okay?” she asked him.

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

The way he looked over at her, tilting his head quizzically, took her by surprise. “Because you just spent time saving my life, crying in the shower, giving me orgasms, and now escorting me while your twin plays havoc with your emotions and fights Mammon.”

Pursing his mouth, he looked ahead. “Those are some good points.”

Her glance up didn’t make him more forthcoming and she decided not the press any further. It could wait until they were downstairs, when he would be less intent on monitoring the shaking of the walls. If anything, their silent walk was useful. It gave her time to think. She felt foolish for not realizing before that she could likely use Beelzebub as a rosetta stone for Belphegor’s behaviour.

“Don’t worry too much over their scuffle,” he said, as if he could read her mind. “They just need to get some excess frustration out of their systems.”

She wrinkled her nose, but said nothing. Telling Beelzebub how stupid she thought that was wouldn’t help either of them.

“I mean, not that you aren’t worth fighting over...just that they’ve been looking for an excuse.”

“I know you’re all really old, but you also know better. Fighting won’t solve the things that have them riled up. It’ll just add to it.”

Beelzebub stopped their progress downstairs, pulling her into a hug. “They’re angry that the other isn’t respecting or understanding their feelings...and are shaken up from your injuries along with other pent up grudges.” She relaxed against him. “They know you can put them in their place, they’re not saying you can’t, they’re just…”

“Beel, you’re squeezing me too hard,” she said, trying to push away.

His whisper barely reached her. “Stay still.”

The tension of his form around her bade her to keep silent more than his words had. Recognizing the black stripes that now peeked out from under her hands, she didn’t move a muscle, but an overwhelming sense of being a startled pheasant rushed back to her.

Ever so slightly, the pressure of his arms around her let up, but she was immediately pressed down to the carpeted hallway floor. Her world had gone dark, its suddenness stabbing fear into her as she tried to bring air back into her shocked body. There was little she could make out around her, but she could feel the warmth of Beelzebub above her. Trying to calm herself, she reached out to find his arms and legs on either side of her, caging her in place. “Beel?” she asked, her voice tight with uncertainty.

A cacophony of thousands of wings surrounded them as Beelzebub shielded her. She tried to look more closely, but the darkness was nearly complete.

Soon, the cocoon became thicker, blotting out the light of the hall around them, and the insects drowned out external sounds with their thick hum. It reminded her of being surrounded by Satan’s power only a few hours ago. Awed, she was tempted to reach out and touch them until Beelzebub flinched above her.

Little pockets of filtered light reached them and she cursed herself for having relaxed so easily. Her body warred between its need to run and the need to rest.

“Get my D.D.D. from my pocket,” Beelzebub shouted above the whirring hum of beating wings. “Call Levi! Hurry!”

Her hands fumbled in the dark, looking for the pocketed D.D.D, fear creeping in, prickling at her scalp to replace the lethargy.

The device in her hands lit up the small cavern of Beelzebub over her, and she squinted at the nearness of the screen while dialing. ‘Please pick up. Please pick up. Please, Levi, don’t have your sound cancelling headset on.’

There was no answer at first, and her breathing began to pick up as the insects whirled faster, heating the air around them and stoking her fear. When Leviathan finally answered, her eyes shot to Beelzebub, but his concentration was steadfast on something outside their cocoon.

“Hey, shouldn’t you be sleeping or something? Mammon told me—”

“Levi, help! We’re in the hall and something’s wrong!”

“What do you mean?” he asked, his voice more serious than she’d ever heard from him. It was different from his jealous rage in the pool, deeper and more direct than the time she’d knocked over one of his figurines.

Beelzebub barked out his answer sharply. “Harrada specters. Hurry. I can’t attack while I have to defend her.”

She listened as closely as she could for a reply, pressing the device harshly against her ear. “Levi? Levi?” There was no answer on the other side, but the call log was still accruing time.

A chill crept down her body, seeping from the top of her head straight down to her feet at an alarming rate. Shivering, she tried to shake away the cold only to find the sensation of wet carpet under her hand. He hadn’t hung up, but Leviathan was already here, she was sure.

The sound of screeching broke through the humming, and slightly more light filtered in between the insects’ ragged wing tips. The floor shook, but nothing more came of it until the shield of insects on her right scattered apart, broken thoraxes and legs showering her. She flinched; it reminded her too much of bone shards. The numbness was starting to wash back over her and she tried to slow her breathing; She needed to be able to think about more than one thing at a time. There couldn’t be a repeat of her stunned slowness that had overcome her at The Fall.

A grating screech erupted next to her, and she huddled against Beelzebub’s arm furthest from it.

Beelzebub hadn’t seemed to move, but the painful shrieking cut off abruptly. She dared to look over her shoulder at the purple glow that now lit up their enclosure; something was undulating under Beelzebub’s crushing hand. Its tailed bulbous head was pointed at her, and four long claws protruded toward her face. If it hadn’t moved, she would have mistaken its claspers for the wavy tentacles of some proto-octopus. The prongs snapped together, inches from her face, and it became apparent how very rigid and sharp they were.

The violet light it exuded flickered and the image of the creature stuttered out of existence only to reappear closer. ‘No no no,’ she thought, trying to wriggle closer to the relative safety of the wall of insects.

The long, recurving blades seemed to only snap in her direction. Her mind dropped back into tiredness and confusion as she wondered why she was always the only prize in this fucked up claw machine game.

Beelzebub crushed the creature’s body once more before closing his fist around it entirely and bringing it to his mouth. A short shriek, and a crunching sound overhead, echoed loudly in the dark, audible even with the sound of wings around them.

As she returned to laying on her back, fluorescent liquid dripped down from the darkness and across her chest. She tensed, expecting it to burn or do something horrific to her skin, but to her relief it only continued to glow. Her body went limp and her eyelids drooped; healing potions always took too much out of her while they worked their magic. If adrenaline stopped flooding her system every few minutes she might’ve fallen asleep there.

The curtain around them parted enough for her to see Beelzebub throw half of the body back out into the hall where it bounced and clattered. A glimpse of him chewing the deflated headsac was the last thing she saw before the living shell around them closed again.

She returned to calling the brothers, but the D.D.D. kept slipping from her grasp as she repeatedly dipped into sleep, the slide of the device always jerking her back to her newest waking nightmare. She continued calling as their shelter continued to thin and shake, but there were never any answers, only smart-alec recordings.

Flashes of light appeared overhead, one after the other, and she shielded her eyes with both hands as Beelzebub dropped to his elbows over her with a grunt.

“Beel?” She knew her voice was tight with fear, for him more than anything.

At this point, everything that tried to eat her was beginning to feel like a dream; her reality was surreal, but her demons being attacked was not something she could so easily push away.

When the dark returned around them, she focused on the form above her. The demon version of GloStick fluid covering her gave off just enough light to see the pain etched in Beelzebub’s face. His eyes were screwed shut, brows drawn together, and his jaw was clenched tightly.

Reaching her hands up, she touched his face and repeated his name, waiting for his eyes to open. They remained closed as he breathed slowly, gurgling.

Everything inside her quaked with dread. She knew that sound. Her hands found and gripped his shoulders. She knew that sound from inside herself. She could feel herself choking on the wet heat at the sound.

Sliding her hands awkwardly down his chest, she felt sharp points; tears threatened to spill out the corners of her eyes. She swallowed the sob in her throat. “Beel. Beel, you have to let me go. You won’t survive if we stay like this.”

The floor shook under them again.

Words didn’t come from him, but a wet, bubbling growl emanated from him instead. A very clear negative. ‘Maybe that meant never?’ she thought, trying to translate, although the exact meaning didn’t matter.

“I won’t let you die as a meatshield, Beel. I can make a break for it and get Satan.”

The growl didn’t change when he answered again, but she could feel his blood dripping, enough to warm her belly.

She stuffed his D.D.D. into her robe pocket. “Don’t you dare let your bugs bite me,” she said, her voice squeaking and tight with remembered pain.

On his elbows, Beelzebub rotated his lower arm to hold down her trembling shoulder. His eyes were glowing orange, brightly enough to match the soft purple light that was still spreading itself thin to drip off the sides of her chest.

Fear was trying to eat at her guts: fear of losing him, fear of what she was about to do, fear of not being fast enough. “I’m sorry, Beel. I’m so sorry” she said, trying not to weep. She hyperventilated, forcing oxygen into her limbs and a lightness into her head. “ **Release me and fight to live.** ”

The insects shot away to join other swarms, and as he lifted away from her she could feel the rage radiating off of him. She didn't have the time, or the strength, to look at him.

No longer in danger of impaling herself under Beelzebub, she flipped over, took a few clumsy first steps, and ran. Her short robe fluttered behind her as she fled towards the safety of Satan’s room, and a wall of water rose up behind her to protect her retreat.


	76. Please Help!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC makes her escape, running for her life and to hopefully save Beelzebub's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, massive thank you to Dalektable, my patient beta reader. This wouldn't be possible without her help.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

_No longer in danger of impaling herself under Beelzebub, she flipped over, took a few clumsy first steps, and ran. Her short robe fluttered behind her as she fled towards the safety of Satan’s room, and a wall of water rose up behind her to protect her retreat._

* * *

Little Demons scurried out of corners and back into crevices between floor boards, popping out to catch the hooked prongs or tails of specters, dragging them down as they glided in and out of her view. When they fell to the floor, the Little Demons descended upon them with gnashing teeth and sharp-taloned fingers. She didn’t stop to watch their work.

The floor under her rolled, warping the floor like an earthquake. ‘Are they still fighting each other outside,’ she wondered, ‘or are they in their own battle with these things?’

Rolling away, she narrowly missed being skewered; the thin fabric of her robe was snagged by a set of prongs and she shrugged out of it to avoid the creature that swam turned back toward her. Beel would never forgive her if she died before getting to Satan. She abandoned the D.D.D. still in the robe’s pocket and ran.

Already, she could feel the itch of sweat under her skin. Pumping her arms, she drifted around a corner to the main stairs; the soles of her feet, slippers long gone, would have rug burn after this, she was sure. She just needed to make it to the other wing. She gasped harshly as she ran and wondered if she was actually fully healed or if this was simply her limit. Continuing forward, she pushed her body forward, even as her lungs screamed for her to stop. Any minute now, her legs would give out.

‘No,’ she thought, jumping over a creature that lurched out of a wall to her right. It was close enough that she noticed the small, pink blisters that decorated the soft portion of its body. She needed a new route, she realized, seeing a swarm of them ahead of her.

Lurching through the library door, she sprinted the length of the cramped second story walkway. If she was lucky, those things wouldn’t be able to see through walls.

She was almost home free. Lucifer’s hidden study wasn’t the only secret in this room. Kicking in the false wall in front of her, she pulled herself through the hidden passageway next to the flue.

There were no grating shrieks of metal, and the static jabber of Little Demons had disappeared.

“Satan?” she called out, her throat still burning. She stumbled in the dark, her hands losing their bracing as the passage opened out onto his bedroom mezzanine.

Her nightgown halted her attempt to crawl and she pulled herself upright on shaking legs. Eyes finally adjusted to the dark she scurried down the spiral staircase. No lit candles, bed empty, only the gurgling and off gassing of Satan’s distilling equipment showed signs of life. Not even Rancor flew to greet her.

Had he gone out already?

She walked to his door, avoiding poorly balanced stacks of books and peeked out into the hall. A harsh shriek near her head stunned her for a moment and she closed the door to the sound.

The human-seeking missile shimmered into existence on her side of the wall. Watching it made her head hurt the way it had when Barbatos clashed together timelines. She stumbled and fell against a pile of books in her haste to avoid the creature’s bladed mouth and gave thanks when she didn’t transform into a kitten or something equally as weak.

Satan’s room was a field of landmines for her. Rolling away, she made for the door again, certain it would take at least a few seconds for it to wiggle its way out of the floor it speared.

The sound of the Little Demons and the shrill screeching to her right could only mean one thing. A split-second decision, she followed her gut and ran to the left, back toward Beelzebub and Leviathan.

As soon as she paused to breathe, she found herself being followed again; purple, bladed blimps cruised towards her without any hint of fatigue. Demons, big or Little, didn’t seem to matter to those things; nothing seemed to slow them except death.

As long as she could continue to dodge them while running, she would be fine. It was mostly a straight shot back to her demons now; she just needed to make it the last little bit. Her muscles were cramping and her head felt light and fuzzy, but she took up running again. She could hear them gaining on her as she climbed the steps of the back stairwell, and she gulped in air, having forgotten to breathe.

True panic begin to seep into the backs of her knees, weakening them, as her momentum took her past the first set of stairs above the entrance hall. The grotesque, knife-mouthed squid were coming from the other direction as well.

That niggling feeling in her gut made her want to puke. They were past the staircase on their side as well.

There were no Little Demons nearby that she could see and there were too many of the purple ghost creatures. She didn’t dare look back in her fatigued state. That left only one option.

“Help!” she screamed as she turned sharply and leapt over the banister.

Pin pricks seared across her back. She sucked in air through the pain, her eyes leaking. It didn’t matter if she had been too slow and they had injured her. She had to keep going and get help. She wouldn’t let Beelzebub bleed out.

She looked left and then right. Everything was the wrong speed again. She wasn’t even falling fast enough to break her legs on the floor below as she’d expected; the air around her was all wrong.

Strong arms wrapped around her before she hit the ground, but she was so blind with fear that she didn’t register them at first, struggling to continue running. Terror muzzled her words.

“Darling, I didn’t expect you to jump into my arms the moment I was home,” Asmodeus said, holding her away from him as she wriggled in his grasp. “Not that I’m complaining. Although you do smell smokey; what have you been up to?”

“Let go. Let go. Let go! They’re right behind me!” she said when she could finally choke out the words. Her voice was high and shrieky, but it didn’t even register for her to care how she sounded. She had no pride. She had self-preservation, and that was enough.

Around her, Asmodeus stiffened and held her tightly against him. The terror in her receded just enough to recognize the sensation of his transformation against her body. There was a swell of his magic that was unmistakable, and a stickiness under her hands. He thrust her behind him roughly, his wings stretching out between them, redder than she remembered. “Keep running,” he said. “Call them inside.”

Without asking what he meant, she darted to the front door, obeying the power laced in his voice more than the actual directive.

As she took the front steps two at a time, she noticed deep rents down her nightgown, giving her space for longer strides. Still looking down while moving, she stumbled, nearly collided with a wall.

For the second time tonight, gloved hands caught her and held her up.

“Please help!” she said, ego discarded. “Beel’s hurt.”

Lucifer took in her torn dress and tearful visage before appraising the house and yard.

“Levi is with him. Asmodeus is in the main hall. I-I couldn’t get to Satan—” she said, spewing information without thought.

Releasing her arms and raising a hand to stop her words, he said simply, “I will go,” and moved to step past her.

She snagged the cuff of his jacket on instinct and realizing she had grabbed at him, held her breath. They saw each other daily, but tonight he seemed more like the predator she knew he was. It felt like she had purposefully put her hand in a bear trap, waiting for it to spring.

The look of alarm as she stared at his blood stained cuff must’ve communicated something to him; she tried to catch her breath as he inspected her expression with greater concentration.

Last time she had seen him, she had been confident, or at least seemed confident. Now, covered in less blood than before, she stood before him, shaken and pleading. “Please don’t leave me here, the specters keep following me,” she said, her eyes snapping up to his face, looking for any hint of mercy.

His frown told her he was dissatisfied, but nonetheless he scooped her up in one arm. She was pressed against his waist only by the pressure of his forearm along her thigh, and when he looked at her, invading what little space there still was between them, she leaned into his body to escape his eyes, clinging to his shoulder, hiding even from him.

With his first step forward her stomach lurched. When he stopped, it was in time to see a blinding light and then the shelter of his black wings. It took several blinks to clear the after image from her sight, but the vertigo from his speed still remained. ‘Please let Beel be okay,’ she prayed to anything listening.

Lucifer readjusted her to fall over his shoulder and her stomach heaved, producing nothing but snot and tears.

“Cover your ears,” he said before a wing pressed over her torso, and a lower wing rose up to smother her while it muffled the sound of explosions nearby.

She stuffed her fingers in her ears tightly even before she understood why. The pressure of Lucifer’s bellow made her gasp and cling with her elbows and knees as her sinuses compressed, choking her on air and mucus.

Before she had time to adjust, Lucifer set her down in front of him and quickly raised his wings around them once more. She grit her teeth when his hand stretched over the punctures in her back to steady her, but she fell against him anyway when the ground beneath them heaved anew.

Bringing the heel of her hand to press against the inner corner of her cheekbone, she tried to breathe and repressurize her head. Unconsciously, she continued to retreat from the direction of the blast as soon as Lucifer had released his hold on her.

Her head didn’t matter. The pain in her back could wait. She leaned against Lucifer, unashamed that she was glad he was home.

When Lucifer unfurled his wings from around them, a purple glow eerily lit up her form from where she was tucked against Lucifer’s side. She peered out, tear-stained and ragged, to find the remains of what had been the back garden. Two points of light were moving toward them, the gold one growing in size faster than the cyan.

She held back her words during the brief moment between Mammon’s arrival and Belphegor’s, taking in how Mammon stared at her in shock. “Harrada specters are in the house,” she said without inflection.

They recoiled as if shot, whether at the news or her delivery she didn’t know.

“I leave to clean up your mess and this is what I return to,” Lucifer said, his words devoid of anger and replaced with something sharper and more frightening.

Squabbling between themselves over whether to stay or go, Belphegor and Mammon continued to glance at her. She looked down at herself, and saw the stickiness of Asmodeus’ embrace for what it had been: bloody. The marks of his hold around her were darker than the blot on her torso from Beelzebub’s wounds.

”What did I run for if you won’t help?” she asked, leaning her forehead against Lucifer’s ribs. She looked over to Belphegor. “ **Beel is badly injured. GO**.”

She wasn’t going to wait through a lecture before rescuing Beelzebub. Lucifer would probably be upset that she’d superseded his authority over the Avatar of Sloth, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. What was done was done. “We can argue after I sleep,” she mumbled, her fingers grasping for purchase in the fabric of his waistcoat.

Closing her eyes, she hid from Mammon and from the responsibility of deciding for him as well; Lucifer would know best how to utilize him. The newest burst of adrenaline continued to seep away from her and she sagged against Lucifer, too tired to think about possible slip ups or the boldness of using the first born as her personal leaning post.

The sensation of Mammon stepping closer tickled at her senses, pulling her out of her near-slumber. It was something she was unfamiliar with, but the whorls of magic that licked at her ankles told her it was him. His power had never reached for her before tonight, but the prickling energy she remembered from him at The Fall was the same. It was softer this time, coaxing, trying to draw her out from under Lucifer’s arm. It felt the same as the warmth when he slept next to her.

“Go help the others,” she heard Lucifer say. “I will watch her for now.”

The words sounded soft, like a reassurance, and not for the first time she wondered how Lucifer could regularly be so harsh with Mammon but still speak like that to him.

She could still feel the pull of magic, gentle like the sound of waves pulling back sand on the beach; it made her want to walk into Mammon’s arms and stay there, safe.

When Lucifer lifted her up again and began walking slowly towards the front entrance, she knew Mammon had left. Thankfully, Lucifer said nothing about her death grip on him, or the tears that leaked from her silently onto his shoulder.

The rustling of fabric brought her attention back to Lucifer. He was unlocking his D.D.D. in his free hand.

Eavesdropping was unavoidable when he called Satan, and she stiffened angrily when Satan answered on the first ring.

“Satan, you didn’t answer the call to the Wild Hunt; can I assume you’re doing something more important?”

“Does the great and powerful Lucifer need my assistance?” Satan asked, his voice muffled, but still audible.

“Are you still at the mausoleum?”

“No, I left to collect health potions for the human.”

Lucifer looked at her, sizing her up again.

She stayed completely still, hoping he’d get distracted and forget about it. Between her choices of meeting his eyes, or looking away, either would confirm that she hadn’t been honest with him about the extent of her injuries. He could see through her too easily.

“Now I’m trying to focus on making more of them here at home,” Satan continued, “and if everyone would stop calling and interrupting my concentration I might even have finished more than two by now!”

“Your tenacity is admirable,’ Lucifer said, his words clipped and sharp. ‘However, the house is under attack.”

An unintelligible curse from Satan was heard and the line went dead.

Calmly, Lucifer put away his D.D.D.

His demonic exterior faded and she traded her grip on one collar for another as his clothes changed under her hands. ‘I’m so stupid,’ she thought. ‘There’s no reason to cling to him like this. No reason to be holding on to his shirt like a child.’ Freeing up one hand from its white knuckled hold, she brushed away the dampness on her cheeks and moved it to rest in her lap by force of will.

The front door was still open from when she’d run away, and light was streaming out into the yard as they walked up the front steps.

“Are you certain you were being followed?” Lucifer asked.

It sounded like he was asking about the monsters in her closet. Offense rose up under the bubble of lethargy. “No, I just ran half the length of the house as a human glow stick and launched myself off the mezzanine to see if I could get a field goal between the gargoyles.”

He raised an unimpressed eyebrow before stepping over the threshold.

One, two, three steps inside and she flattened herself against his shoulder when a purple blur skittered in and out of her periphery. It fell to the floor with a sickening thud and twitched at Lucifer’s feet. He lifted his free hand and it burned into pale violet ashes.

She peeked down at it. Definitely dead.

Four, five, six, seven steps, and another dropped to the floor. As each living projectile fell to ash before them, she slowly straightened up, no longer cowering against his shoulder.

It was uncomfortably quiet as Lucifer carried her up the stairs and into her room. He wasn’t speaking, and she took the silence to listen intently for anything that would indicate the well-being of the others. Nothing.

“Shouldn’t we go check on them?” she finally asked when Lucifer sat down on her bed, taking her with him. She still couldn’t bring herself to remove her remaining hand from his clothing; it offered too much reassurance.

“No, they are more than capable of eradicating the vermin,” he said as he adjusted her to sit with her back almost against his chest, and unhooked her fingers from his shirt. “Even the Little Demons could do so with enough time and motivation.”

“But—” A reedy noise of pain left her when Lucifer pressed her back against his chest.

“What was that?” he asked, but she knew it for the accusation that it was.

“If I say ‘nothing’ will you believe me?”

The stony silence and his rigid poster around her was the only answer he gave.


	77. Formation!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC has had a seriously tumultuous night (dancing, kidnapping, almost dying, bravado for Diavolo, a sort of foursome, almost losing Beel while she's also in mortal peril...etc.), but that doesn't mean Lucifer will go easy on her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, MASSIVE thanks to Dalektable, my patient beta reader. This wouldn't be possible without her help.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

_“No, they are more than capable of eradicating the vermin,” Lucifer said as he adjusted her to sit with her back almost against his chest, and unhooking her fingers from his shirt. “Even the Little Demons could do so with enough time and motivation.”_

_“But—” A reedy noise of pain left her when Lucifer pressed her back against his chest._

_“What was that?” he asked, but she knew it for the accusation that it was._

_“If I say ‘nothing’ will you believe me?”_

_The stony silence and his rigid poster around her was his only answer._

* * *

“I don’t know. I can’t see it!” she said, leaning forward to expose her back. “It happened right after I jumped off of the balistraud down to the front hall.”

It was almost as bad as trying to get an explanation out of Leviathan. He resisted the urge to shake her.

She shrunk away from him, as if she could feel his hand about to touch her.

“Hold still.”

Her disdain for taking orders practically rolled off of her with the way she fisted her hands and drew them into herself, crossing her arms over her stomach. It was with a sense of satisfaction that he held back his criticism and laughter when she leaned forward without a fight, in possibly the only act of submission he’d never had to drag out of her.

His gloves skated over her skin and nightgown, tugging at the fabric occasionally to look at one wound or another.

“And you don’t know what caused these?”

“No. Just that Asmodeus caught me before I shattered both my knees while landing,” she said, barely keeping the curtness out of her words. Her head was bowed too low for him to discern anything beyond frustration and pain from her.

“You’ll survive. Lean back,” he said. He had a fair idea of what had caused the gashes from her the middle of her ribs upward, which meant her recklessness had been beyond the pale.

She moved to stand up instead, but her bare feet met air. His hands around her waist had allowed her to move forward, not to step away.

He had no patience for her antics today.

“Lucifer!” she said, “Why can’t we go check on them? At least one of those things went all the way through Beel!”

When something purple shimmered through the floor, he drew her feet back quickly to rest against his shins. A small whirl of ash littered where the speck of colour had been, and Lucifer found her quickly seated once more.

“Great, the floor is lava now,” she said as she slowly and gingerly leaned back against his chest once more.

“If I need to tie you down to keep you safe I will,” he said simply, watching for any further wincing as he pulled her more securely against him. He was sure if humans could spontaneously combust out of spite, she would be the first one to learn how.

When he was content she wouldn’t move on her own, he searched his pants pocket for his D.D.D and managed not to chuckle when she stiffened uncomfortably. One handed, he typed rapidly while she grew more and more impatient, looking this way and that, leaning slightly towards small noises.

“Stop fretting,” he said without slowing his messaging.

“I’m not fretting.”

‘Don’t strangle the human. Lord Diavolo wants to keep her alive,’ he reminded himself. His left eye was already twitching. It wasn’t her fault there were spectres in the house. She’d probably never even seen an injured demon before today.

He paused to consider that, watching her fidget with a torn piece of her nightgown. The carnage of the room she’d left behind at The Fall had been impressive; he’d yet to figure out how she’d done it. The ligature marks he understood, but the empty chest cavity would take some explaining.

Two more bodies at her feet before she’d left, and seeing Beelzebub injured today, was more than she’d likely seen in her entire stay here, likely her whole life. He knew from Mammon’s infrequent reports that he’d dispatched more than a few would be captors, but always out of her sight. It would explain why she had clung to him like a cambion. ‘At least she’s not sobbing like one.’

He was alert when she leaned forward again. This time she didn’t try to move off of his lap, but watched intently as Little Demons began to gather at their feet.

“It seems it is safe to let you loose in this room,” he said, feeling her needling questions before she opened her mouth.

Immediately, she stepped away from him and walked toward the bathroom, pausing when his steps followed after hers, mimicking the way he’d hunted her here only a few nights ago.

“Um,” she said, trying to figure out what he expected. “You said it’s safe now, so…”

“It is safe enough for you to move about on your own, yes, but not enough to be out of my sight. Gather your things, you’ll be staying with me for the remainder of the evening.”

Her mouth dropped open in surprise.

Wisely, she closed it as she took in his judgemental gaze.

Lucifer’s patience was quickly dwindling as he took time to glance around the chaos of her room: blood stained rugs, soiled comforter, shoes and potion bottles tossed haphazardously everywhere.

“Right then. Should I shower here or...” she asked, looking down at her destroyed nightdress.

“Pack what you need. You may use my facilities,” he said, before narrowing his eyes and fixing her with a look that shut down any future argument. “However, I’m not washing your hair again unless your arms magically fall off.”

“I’m sure that could be arranged,” she said, muttering to herself as she moved across the room to choose an overnight bag.

“What was that?”

“I said ‘Fair, I wouldn’t want to be maimed’.” She poked her hand into a crack in the wall between her room and the kitchen, tugging out a small pouch and tossing it into her bag.

He scowled as he watched her reef on the bottom drawer of her dresser. “If you’re stalling, thinking that I’ll stand here all night, you are very mistaken,” Lucifer said, watching as she struggled with the drawer.

Her shoulders tensed, and just as quickly dropped, until only small muscle spasms belied her frustration and pain. “Asmodeus has replaced all of my pajamas with lingerie,” she said, her voice low. It held the promise of retribution.

“I see,” Lucifer said as she stuffed something that looked like it might be large enough to cover her into the bag. Curiously, he watched as she dragged a small pouch out from under the dresser and tossed it in too. She was almost as much of a hoarding magpie as Mammon, or that or she needed to hide her possessions from the Avatar of Greed. It didn’t matter. As long as her belongings helped keep her asleep later he’d allow it.

Once more she moved to the bathroom and he followed, taking his time calculating just how injured she must’ve been by counting out the bottles he could readily see. He frowned at the sight of Beelzebub’s white jacket next to a chunk of eye, still impaled on one of her shoes.

He harboured curiosity for her proclivity for gathering odd things, but her dawdling was quickling wearing the last of his tolerance for her oddities thin. It had been a long day already and he knew it was far from over.

Dragging a chair next to the tree, she stepped onto it and stretched up, reaching slowly into the branches. He watched her wince. A third pouch, larger than the last two, was pulled out and packed away. “Ready to go,” she said as she stepped down from the chair, her knees almost giving out from under her as she did.

It was a shame these were the circumstances he would have to test and interrogate her under. He had never seen her weaker. Uncrossing his arms, Lucifer strode swiftly to her bedroom door, opened it, and disappeared around the corner.

She followed as quickly as she could given his surprise retreat, annoyance bubbling up inside of her.

Her ready complaint was stolen out of her throat as a squeak when she was lifted up and nearly crushed against Beelzebub’s chest. There was a clamour of voices around them when he kissed her, but all of her thought was driven away. He’d kissed her so quickly she hadn’t even caught a glimpse of his face, so instantaneous and urgent was his mouth on hers.

A mixture of hunger and anger filtered into her as he held her aloft, orange light seeping out from Beelzebub’s closed eyes. His mouth was demanding and punishing as he took reassurance from her. She could feel his arms flex around her and a wash of fury that felt like pop rocks pricking in her veins.

Somewhere in the doorway she’d lost her bag, and in Beelzebub’s grasp, her mind; when his mouth moved to her neck she had no inhibitions. It was the growl that travelled into her bones as forcefully as a freight train that brought her back to her senses. She blinked rapidly, clearing the fog and letting her surroundings return to her periphery.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” she said as she raised a hand to wipe away a tear from his cheek.

“We will be having a very serious talk about this later,” Beelzebub said, as Lucifer’s growl began to rise around them again.

He set her down, and she looked to her left, searching for the source of the chilling sound. It was familiar, and she found it just as Belphegor enveloped her body from behind, muffling the way the warning shook her.

The pain of Belphegor against her back wasn’t much, not in comparison to the last twenty-four hours of trauma, but it still startled her into dropping to the floor. Belphegor moved faster than her fall. She made it to her knees, and no further, as he held her, examining her back.

“Can’t leave you alone for more than a few minutes,” he said, amidst the growing cacophony of her demons arguing with one another.

It sounded like a complaint from him, but she knew it wasn’t, not the way his hands trembled over her skin. She didn’t answer him, too busy re-establishing eye contact with the source of the growl, Lucifer; it made her want to hide.

What could the asshat possibly want when he knew sleep and pain were threatening to overtake her? He’d seen the potion bottles in her room. That twisted bastard _would_ save this for when she was at her wits end and her legs feel like they were going to drop off.

There was discord all around them; it had started up again as soon as the severity of the growl dipped, but Lucifer’s eyes were on her, judging her. His discontent still rumbled low and she could feel it buzzing against her knees through the carpeted hall.

A prod to one of her cuts had her eyes squeezing shut and exhaling what air was left in her lungs. It was clear Lucifer expected something from her. From them maybe? They weren’t responding to it, so it had to be directed at her. Whatever it was, she should just tell him to shove it up his arse!

With slow purpose she squeezed Belphegor’s hands, a silent cue for him to move. She stood while he continued to hover protectively around her. This wasn’t a challenge she could afford to toss aside; The intensity of Lucifer’s growl made it seem too important.

She looked around as Satan held back Mammon from jamming his finger in Beelzebub’s face. Leviathan was doing a poor job of not strangling Asmodeus. Only Lucifer and Belphegor were quiet, both intent on watching her despite the beginnings of a brawl around them.

There were too many differences between this emergency and others for her to guess at Lucifer’s motivation. Her hand going stiffly to her hip, she shifted her weight to that side, meeting Lucifer’s gaze once more. “Really, we’re doing this right now?” she asked loudly, her words coated in her fatigue and disbelief. Whatever this was, she already knew his answer.

Lightheadedness was ready to take her if she’d give in to it; she could slough off the battle ahead, just be a slug and sleep. Only damsels get to faint and cry. There was no respect to be found in that.

Weakness. She felt the burn of Lucifer’s verdict circling her, pinning her in place with his eyes. His pre-determined bench trial was not going to go the way he wanted it to. How many times had she crashed her own funeral now? There was no plan that she could concoct for this, not in her state, but if he wanted to tango, she was damn well going to be the one leading.

She didn’t know what he wanted from her, but her demons needed to stop fighting one another, whether that was part of Lucifer’s scheme or not. Head bowed with fatigue and pain, she pointed to the wall. “ **Fall in** ,” she said.

Her voice hadn’t been loud enough for anyone but Belphegor to hear, and she snagged at any bit of magic she could feel. It was like plucking at invisible strings as they slid through her grasp, trying to pull them in the right direction to obey her thoughts, hoping they were still in her clutches as she tried to imbue her will.

The rising indignation in the hallway could be felt in the whorls of magic that tried to buffet her, each with its own particular sting. All but Mammon.

Looking up, all eyes were on her but his.

She could see Satan was livid, his eyes wide and tail thrashing, breaking chunks out of the wall behind him. ‘Deep breaths,’ she reminded herself before she collected her bag. Satan would likely never translate another book for her after this.

Stepping toward them, she met each harsh stare in turn. They were her corridor now, the no man's land between her authority and Lucifer's. She tried to gauge her opponent as his chin lifted minutely. Not a failure in his eyes yet at least. Her mouth went dry as he continued to stare. A misstep or victory here would mean something important.

Sifting through her memories of ‘ _De re militari_ ’ and her discussions dissecting it with Satan, she squared her shoulders to her demons. “ **Eyes forward**.” At least it was only Lucifer’s gaze she needed to withstand now.

If the lightheadedness would clear and her hands would stop sweating, she might be able to pull this off. The strain of the pacts against her felt as though the threads she’d tugged at before were catching against her, needling and biting. This had never happened before. There was nowhere for her hands to scrabble and claw at to stop it either. It was somewhere inside her.

“I didn’t think I’d have to say ‘ **At Attention** ,’ Satan,” her voice was a whisper, but he drew his creeping foot back into line as if slapped. His tail no longer thrashed when she stepped forward again. She would ignore Lucifer entirely while she inspected her troops, starting with the closest, Belphegor.

Her hands skimmed under the fringe of his hair, searching his face for any sign of pain. There was only a small smirk as he stole a kiss to her palm when it stopped at his cheek. No injuries other than a few scuffs and bruises. “No more fighting, please,” she said quietly, too tired to take him to task just yet.

Moving on, she ran her fingers over the holes in Beelzebub’s shirt. The wounds had closed over, but the skin there was still pink and looked tender. It was hard to tell for sure with the spector ichor he was splattered in, but he seemed whole. “You’re okay?” she asked.

“I will be,” he answered curtly, his eyes still looking over her head.

She nodded sadly, and removed her fingers from his skin, looking to Asmodeus ahead of her.

She couldn’t help the lopsided smile that bloomed at the sight of him; he was positively covered in blood, doused from head to toe. Only a clean streak over his left eye and cheek were clear of it.

Tossing her bag near Lucifer’s feed, she turned over Asmodeus’ hands in her own; he didn’t flinch from her inspection, nor the caked blood that cracked and fell between them. Asmodeus never would've stopped complaining if his body were harmed.

“And here I thought violet was your best colour,” she said before she released his hands and stepped past him.

Satan wore more ichor than Asmodeus wore blood, and if he hadn’t been looking straight ahead, his glare would have burned a hole clean through her. While he was uninjured, with the way each of his breaths shook she knew there was a new and different sort of injury. She’d never commanded him before, and certainly not in a way that defied his will. This needed to be fixed before it festered between them.

Lifting Satan’s hands from his sides she placed them softly around her neck and left them there. His thumbs lifted with the movement of her nervous swallow. She could almost see the loose threads of magic lashing in her mind’s eye like a whip trying to reach her, and they didn’t all stem from Satan.

There was enough magic building in the air now that it disturbed her hair. “Look at me,” she said, her pulse beating wildly, bolstering the strength of her dizziness. The pain, thankfully, had become intermittent. It was difficult to tell when it would weaken her resolve with its intensity, and she sucked in air during the reprieve.

A protruding vein was visible above Satan’s brow, pulsing into his hairline, but his hands only twitched around her throat.

“I trust you, Satan,” she said, her voice small and brittle. It didn’t need to be louder with the way it carried in the unnatural silence of the hall. “Please don’t be angry with me because you chose to trust me too.”

His eyes softened, but she still felt like she was bleeding somewhere inside. It didn’t hurt like before, but it wasn’t staunched either. ‘Is this what it’s supposed to feel like when they resist?’ she wondered. She tried to keep herself from curling inward. “Speak to me,” she said, her voice even quieter to hide her pain.

The string that had cut at her most went slack.

There was silence while his thumbs softly stroked along her trachea. “Too late for regrets now,” he said. The corners of his mouth lifted a fraction before he dropped his hands to his sides and looked ahead.

The atmosphere in the hall didn’t settle until she’d stepped closer to Leviathan. Seeing him look so serious, without a screen to light or block his face, was more distracting than she’d expected. She tilted her head from side to side, and his eyes tried to flit down to follow her movement. There wasn’t a speck of viscera on him.

“Lean down to my height?” she asked, testing a request against an order again. She stepped back to give him more room. It seemed requests definitely could override orders. At least something good had come of this farce.

His tail balanced him as he bent to her height and she was nearly overcome with the urge to hug him. Being wrapped up in his tail again while they movie marathoned, cozy and safe in his bathtub, sounded like exactly what she needed.

It would have to wait for another day. She cupped her hand to her mouth and whispered in his ear. “Thank you for coming to save us.” The smallest turn of her head and she pecked his cheek before stepping away, towards Mammon.

From her periphery, it was easy to see that Leviathan’s face now matched Asmodeus’ shade for shade, but he’d managed to stand straight again instead of shrinking in on himself. His confidence made her want to be brave too.

Being this close to Mammon was difficult; there were too many conflicting emotions between them. She looked up at him and was struck again by just how beautiful he was. The tendons of his neck stood out, betraying his tension, but it took nothing away from his presentation: eyes front, shoulders back, and his wings folded. He looked every inch the ready soldier. Sometimes she forgot that he wasn’t an angel, wasn’t just her goofball. His horns looked sharper from here.

“Are you hurt?” she asked.

“No, ma’am.”

A sick feeling flooded through her, like thousands of tiny bees dancing over the lining of her stomach.

“Mammon?” she asked, taking one of his hands in hers. “Are you okay?”

“No, ma’am.” His gaze was still straight over her head.

“I release you from formation orders. What’s wr—”

He was wrapped around her in an instant, his face hidden from all but Lucifer as he clutched her to him. “Forgive me. Please forgive me,” he whispered to her over and over.

When her hand found its way into his hair a small sob broke from him.

“Please,” he said into her neck.

She continued ignoring Lucifer and his growing impatience despite the insistence of his shoe tapping against the carpet. “Mammon, you saved me. There’s nothing to forgive. I should be saying thank you,” she said, as wisps of his power swirled under their feet.

Abruptly pulling away, he stumbled back to the wall, and fell to his knees with a look of horror that she wasn’t prepared for.

“Mammon?” she said as she reached for his shoulder, but there was no reaction at her touch.

She glanced at Lucifer.The slight incline of his head, the way his lips were pinched together and nostrils flared ever so slightly, were useless to her. He had no guidance for her, only the vertical lines between his brows growing deeper.

Mammon closed his eyes against the sight of her, and she watched his emotions flit across his face. It was open and naked in a way that she’d never seen before. The pain there hurt her worse than the magic had.

“Mammon! Look at me.”

His eyes opened and met hers, and she struggled not to drown in the blue of them and the defeat she found there. She cupped her hands around his face. “I forgive you,” she said.

There it was. The little golden glint of hope she’d been waiting to see in his eyes. “No refunds,” she said before he stood to smother her again, breathing in the scent of her neck and hair.

She stole a small kiss to his temple where Lucifer couldn’t see. “Back to attention, please,” she said softly, straightening and stepping away, leaving him to fall in line.

Stepping backward to better look at all of them, she wrestled with the idea that each of them wanted to protect her, that it wasn’t just for Diavolo’s sake. Demons weren’t known for loyalty without strict repercussions and she had nothing but weak words. Her cheeks were pink from emotion and pain. “Rest Easy,” she said before turning sharply to address Lucifer.

“Are you quite done?” Lucifer asked, his brow no longer furrowed in the extreme; his annoyance was only discernible by his tone and the small quirk of his lips to one side.

Her hands itched to wrap around herself. She kept them loose at her sides. There was no help to still their trembling. At least she hadn’t failed Mammon. “I told you I wanted to see them,” she said, realizing belatedly that she was highlighting her earlier defiance. She looked over to her bag at his feet and tried not to fidget. “I assume you’ll want reports?” she asked him. Giving ground even after her instigation wasn’t an option.

Lucifer’s eyes narrowed, and she worked hard to meet them as they faded back and forth between red and black. It was a struggle not to fall into them. Exhaustion was not her friend right now. There would be no hypnotic distraction tonight!

“Yes, written reports,” he said, his words clipped.

She licked her lips, and remained with her body facing him, only turning her head when she addressed her demons. “I expect all reports to be written in the next half hour. There will be no exchanging of details until they are all completed. You will submit them to Leviathan for further conveyance.” There was a subtle shift of movement amongst them, but no strain or argument. “Dismissed,” she said, meeting Lucifer’s stare once more.

The look of surprise on his face was a short lived sight for her as she was quickly taken to the ground by the mob of demons.

“Who do you think you’re bossin’ around, huh?”

“N-normies shouldn’t—aagh never mind.”

“I never should’ve read you that book!”

“What do you think you're doing? She’s still injured, you idiots!” Belphegor said, picking up Asmodeus by the scruff and tossing him away like a winged rag-doll.

It hurt, but she was still laughing under Satan and Leviathan until Beelzebub removed them, one under each of his arms. Mammon was squished beneath her, saving her from rug burn.

“Hurry up,” Belphegor said around a yawn, his voice sleepy and impatient as he reached for her. “Let’s get you to bed.”

She couldn’t stifle the yelp of pain as Mammon sat up with his arms around her, the buckles of his jacket scraping across her back.

“Indeed,” said Lucifer, cutting off the beginnings of more posturing. “She will be spending the remainder of the night with me.”

Fuck. He just had to say it like that. During sleep research they’d all demanded to camp with her in Lucifer’s room. His phrasing was only going to rile them back up. This time, she wasn’t already asleep when they found out, as she had been after calming Leviathan. Why couldn’t he just say “ _staying in my room?_ ”

Immediately, the hallway erupted with dissent. Leviathan’s “So unfair!” was the loudest amongst them, but it didn’t hold a candle to the possessive flair of magic she felt light up around her.

The black and yellow energy slowly became opaque, shielding her from view, and she shivered. When she unwrapped Mammon’s arms from her waist and shoulder, the magic faded quickly, dancing away from her skin. It was gone by the time she stood, and she stepped directly into where it would have been.

It felt like physical comfort not to have to fight with Mammon right now, as if the lack of fighting were a tangible hug around her. This place was making her stranger by the day.

Readjusting what was left of her dress for modesty, she walked the few steps to collect her bag. Each step covered a different mental walk-through of her night were she to spend it with any of them.

“Enough dawdling,” Lucifer said, turning to walk away. His hand lifted and fingers flicked forward to speed her onward, or possibly just to piss her off. She wasn’t entirely certain which it was, knowing him either option was fine.

The agitation of the demons around her was palpable; she could hear it in the rustle of wings and tails, but she had to think of herself right now. Eventually, they’d cool down and understand. She gave them all an apologetic smile and jogged to catch up to Lucifer on unstable legs.

Ungracefully, she reached out and took his hand. If he was surprised by her action, he didn’t show it, taking her bag from her before he pulled her along behind him.


	78. Report In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time to follow through on MC's order.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more a ginormous thank you to Dalektable for her hard work in editing this for me!
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th

They had all arrived at her door at the same time, and now they were left there without her, watching Lucifer lead her away like a lamb.

Quickly, Mammon stood, keeping his eyes trained on Belphegor, ready to drag him back outside. The only thing that stopped him was a peek of red, partially obscured by Beelzebub.

“WHERE WERE YOU?” Mammon asked, his words bare of everything but malice.

Catching Mammon before he could lunge, Satan hoisted him up, teetering him forward over his right shoulder as Mammon clawed at the air, trying to reach Asmodeus.

Pink energy began to glow along the edges of Asmodeus’ lashlines. “How was I supposed to know? I left her with you!”

“This isn’t the time to argue,” Leviathan said as he grabbed Mammon’s legs, impeding the knee blows raining down on Satan’s back. Orders first. Fight second.” He could already feel the beginnings of her command tightening around his body, coercing him to obey.

Mammon snarled as Satan secured his arms. Still he struggled, beating his wings to get closer to Asmodeus.

“The things I do for this club,” Asmodeus said, narrowly avoiding Mammon’s gnashing teeth as he worked to pin the wings that stabbed at Leviathan.

Beelzebub and Belphegor looked at one another; for the first time in recent memory they weren't on the receiving end of Mammon’s scathing glare. Their emotions in sync for the first time in weeks, they both sent Leviathan a questioning look.

“Got this under control here,” Leviathan said to himself as much as to the twins. “Get started on your reports. We’ll take him down to the common room to cool off.”

Together, the three of them struggled to drag Mammon away from the human’s bedroom door. “Meet us down there when you’re done with your reports,” Leviathan said, shouted back to them over Mammon’s cursing.

Together they jerked back and forth like a wounded caterpillar. Every time Mammon’s wings would break loose they became a crippled and poorly formed butterfly, beating futility at itself, as they fell down the stairwell together.

* * *

They were panting by the time Leviathan’s tail opened the door to the common room for them.

The room flooded with fury as they entered, enough for Satan to feel the beginnings of his own anger’s tether relaxing. He exhaled slowly to stall the fueling of his brother’s ire. “Mammon, you have to get a hold of yourself.”

“I’ll do that just as soon as I get a hold of Asmo,” he said, freeing a hand from Satan’s grasp to point backwards. “Come here, ya scrawny little spitfuck, let me tear yer wings off!”

“Mammon,” Satan said, his voice a deadly whisper. “Do you remember what happened when I stepped out of line?”

“So the fuck what? She made you step back! Now let me go!” His words, laced with power, shook the light fixtures in their sconces.

“No, Mammon,” Satan said, just as quietly as before. The growl accompanying it, however, rattled through the room anew, following everywhere Mammon’s voice had touched. The feeling was of retching and pain, composed in gravel and grating stone.

Asmodeus and Leviathan looked at one another in confusion as Mammon continued to rant. “I don’t give a fuck about your pain, Satan. Let me down—”

“Her pain, you moron!” Satan said loudly, flinching as Mammon’s claws punctured into his chest before stilling.

“What’re ya sayin’?” Mammon asked. His words were still harsh and sharp, but he no longer struggled.

Satan dropped Mammon from his shoulder, leaving Leviathan and Asmodeus scrambling to set him down without letting him swing face first into the floor.

“I’m saying that when I disobeyed, it hurt her!” Satan’s words left him explosively as he picked up a chair and launched it at the fireplace. It shattered and splintered on contact. “She has no magic to protect her from the pacts, Mammon! She’s cutting her own fucking soul on us.”

The room went silent as Satan sat down on the couch and dragged his hands through his hair. Knees on his elbows, he lifted his head to stare at the fire. Both hands lifted, shaking, to cover his mouth as he tried to figure out why she would do something so stupid.

Mammon disentangled himself carefully, and walked quickly away from them; the sound of him digging through the writing desk was the only distraction to break the poignant silence.

Even staring into the fire, Satan knew that Leviathan and Asmodeus would be trying to stare through the ceiling, toward Lucifer’s room. They could be so predictable. Why couldn’t she be as predictable?

A notepad landed on the couch next to Satan, breaking his concentration. Moments later a pen hit the back of his shoulder.

Shoving writing implements into his other brothers’ hands, Mammon sat down at the table without another word, and began writing. His movements over the page were frantic.

None of them said anything. The furious scratching of pen and the flipping of pages was the only sound over the crackling of the fire. With each minute they all became more aware of the pull on their pacts.

“Done!” Leviathan said. “I’ll start converting it.”

No one responded to his enthusiasm, too focused on the time ticking away.

When the twins joined them in the common room, it was clear that they could also feel the strain. The tension around their eyes and the set of their jaws visibly relaxed once they handed their reports to Leviathan, who fed the stacks into a slot in the panelled wall.

When they’d all completed their task, the physical slack did nothing to relieve the tension left in the room.

“Hand ‘em over, Levi,” Mammon said, hovering at his shoulder. “We’ve already done a sweep of the house and I’m less likely to behead someone if I get ta readin’.”

“I hate doing conversions. Why can’t you do them yourselves?” Leviathan asked, his voice tired, as he removed his palm from the wall and slumped over the writing desk. The syphoning effects of magical conversion were always uncomfortable for him. “There. I’ve sent copies to all of us, Lucifer, and Barbatos.”

At the soft ding of D.D.D.s around the room, Mammon reached for his pocket as if he were drawing it for a shootout.

Leviathan’s complaint went unanswered as their eyes darted from screens to one another and back, ignoring all else as they scrolled through each other’s reports. He sat in the writing desk’s chair, his feet tapping anxiously when Mammon began to pace while he read.

Belphegor looked over at the two would-be-piñatas as he settled into a comfortable armchair. His narrowed eyes and suspicious expression said what all of them were thinking: How could they both believe the other was with her? Mammon and Asmodeus were self absorbed and oblivious, but wouldn’t lie to cover their asses about it, not when it was serious. Belphegor’s nails clicked loudly against the wooden armrest as he continued reading.

Setting down his D.D.D. first, Satan took a lap of the room to think about the information they’d all provided, avoiding the straight line Mammon was treading across the room.

Mammon’s description of the cloakroom had been intense, especially given a human’s capabilities. “There was no reason for the scale demon to explode…” he said, mumbling to himself.

The faint sound of Leviathan’s tail, thumping lightly on the rug, was a steady beat to which Satan continued to walk in sync, lost in his thoughts.

* * *

Staring at his screen, Mammon realized that neither he nor the twins had mentioned the reason for ‘sparring’ outside. He swallowed and debated amending his report. Between the three of them, everything was written vaguely, the exception being her long list of injuries. Those were all precise. Detailed. They made his stomach clench. If he wanted to amend his report, he’d talk to Lucifer directly. He tossed his pen back at the desk, narrowly avoiding Leviathan.

He ground his teeth together and resisted the temptation to skim through the other reports to get to Asmodeus’. Every bit of information was important; one missed thing could be the difference between life and death. That had been a lesson he’d learned harshly; they’d almost lost Satan during the first rebellion.

Asmodeus continued to flick his gaze back and forth between Mammon and Beelzebub, eventually pitching his D.D.D. onto the opposite couch. His frown was going to cause wrinkles, but apparently tonight he couldn’t find it in him to will it away. “Our human was taken right out from under us!” The blood he’d shed while on the Wild Hunt wasn’t nearly enough against this atrocity. “They invaded our home with the lowest of vermin. Disgusting creatures! But worst of all, they tried to take her.”

The need for retribution and blood glowed softly around him, still carefully contained. A cruel smile spread over his lips, springing from something dark and pulsing inside him, and his eyes lit a deep shade of pink. “I’m certain we destroyed every last one of them, but Lucifer suggested there were other cells when he was done interrogating the cloak attendant.” There would be more to sate his need for revenge soon enough.

“A doppelgänger,” Satan said finally, stopping to lean against the fireplace. He didn’t continue until he had everyone’s attention. “Asmo would be able to see through any other type of illusion.” The hasty flick of his free hand counted off each point like a conductor’s beat. “He’s virtually impervious to all charms and potions. Mimics can’t nod their heads. Shadows would easily be dispersed under the moving lights. It's the only thing I can think of that could imitate Mammon.”

All of them shifted uncomfortably at his conclusion, and avoided looking at one another until Asmodeus spoke up, his words dripping with disdain. “Why would anyone ever work with a doppelgänger? They’re the least trustworthy demon there is. Even the imps shun them.”

“Probably the same reason they used the unreliable muscle of scale demons,” Beelzebub said from the couch nearest Belphegor’s chair.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Leviathan said. “No one is that desperate to work with such sketchy variables while risking Diavolo’s counterattack.”

“They’re someone with deep pockets, or funded by someone with ‘em,” Mammon said, his brows knitted together while he fiddled with his D.D.D. charm between his fingers. “Harrada specters aren’t cheap. They’re almost impossible to find in the wild now. Definitely impossible to get in those numbers outside of a breedin’ facility. Would take a few decades at least to get this many. Don’t even know what it would cost to get this many all at once...”

“It’s insulting that they released them at all,” Asmodeus said, breathing deeply through his nose after his outburst.

“They weren’t for us, Asmo,” Mammon said quietly, his gaze travelling miles away.

The crackling of the fire was the soundtrack to Asmodeus’ understanding. Mammon watched out of the corner of his eye as Asmodeus’ wings twitched outwards and his eyes became glassy and far away. Opening and closing his mouth a few times, his hands crept forward over an imaginary form until he caught himself, choosing instead to wrap his arms around his torso.

“I’m more concerned that someone knew that the wards around the pool were weak,” Leviathan said, holding his tail.

Mammon knew his brother, if he set it down he was likely to accidentally cut the legs out from under the desk.

“It means, whoever they were,they were watching. Waiting,” Leviathan said.

The twitch of Leviathan’s tale brought a small smile to Mammon’s otherwise grim demeanor. Some things never changed.

“You’ll need to keep an eye on the pantheptera,” Belphegor said, looking to Satan. “The cat would be an easy target as well, and I have no doubt our human would chase after her.”

‘He said “our human,”’ Mammon thought, doing his best not to change his posture or the level of his attention to the overall room. Was that a new tactic? It definitely wasn’t what he had taunted Mammon with earlier. Likely some new mind game.

Satan nodded in agreement with both Leviathan and Belphegor, saying nothing for the time being, returning to searching the fire for answers.

“We’ll need to password protect when taking up posts or retiring,” Mammon said, trying to straighten up and hide the tension that was curling through his spine. “Calls and messages are still encrypted and can be trusted for now, but no one takes charge of the human without their codes.”

“Astral passwords this week?” Asmodeus asked.

Everyone nodded.

Mammon surveilled the room, both disturbed and pleased with the ease of their agreement. “Botany the following week, cosmetics,” he said with a nod to Asmodeus, “and druidic after.”

“You think it'll take that long?” Leviathan asked, leaning forward in his chair. His lips pressed into a harsh line. “She won’t sit still for four weeks. Not happily, anyway.”

A slow shrug was the answer he received as Mammon looked away and rubbed at the back of his neck. If they didn’t stretch to zoology codes and beyond he’d be happy.

“We’ll need to find a way to shield her mind from future doppelgänger activities,” Satan said, strumming his hand on the stone of the fireplace before picking up a long sliver of broken chair and tossing it into the fire. “We’ll be fine, but we can’t take her ability to repel Asmodeus’ charm as protection against mind reading as well.”

A cough came from the armchair. “Actually,” Belphegor said, righting himself somewhat in the overstuffed armchair. He tilted his head to the side in thought, resting it against the hand he’d propped up on the armrest. “Her mental defenses are quite good. When I’ve been doing nightmare rounds she’s removed me, and I don’t mean accidentally. She’s given me an earful about it before tossing me out on my ass and blocking me entirely.” His amused smile melted away.

An ominous chill swept through the room, smothering and heavy, as Beelzebub turned and glared. His feet spread outward as if to widen his stance when he stood, but his clenched fists remained laying on his knees. The couch legs creaked under an unseen strain, and a faint buzzing began to muffle the sound around them.

“What? It was just rounds!” Belphegor said, tossing his hands up to demonstrate his innocence, warding off his twin’s death glare. “She’s as likely as any of us to need to be pulled out of nightmares.”

Beelzebub’s head remained tilted back, looking down at Belphegor, keeping his lips pulled to one side with poorly hidden contempt. Slowly, the pressure he’d inadvertently put on the surrounding area evapourated and his sneer began to lessen.

The rest of the room breathed a collective sigh of relief. Beelzebub must not’ve found any untruth in Belphegor’s feelings. Mammon unclenched his hand from around his D.D.D., which creaked with the sudden shift in pressure.

Before they could resume their disagreement, or work through the nuances of wording, Mammon gave orders. “Levi, contact Barbatos directly. We need to know why he didn’t see any of this coming. Asmo, do another sweep of the perimeter, with special attention to the pool. Nothing slips through. Satan, return to your potion making, we may need them soon. Beel—”

A loud knock at the front door echoed through the house.

The brothers’ hackles rose and wings fluttered.

“Sorry, she said she wanted to order tacos,” Beelzebub said with a shrug, before getting up from his seat. “I’ll be right back.”

Everyone stared dumbly as he walked away.

“It’s a hassle, but I have a package to put together before I can sleep,” Belphegor said, standing and stuffing his hands in his pockets as he followed Beelzebub out of the common room doors.


	79. Visitors

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more a ginormous thank you to Dalektable for her hard work in editing this for me!
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th, the early hours.

_The agitation of the demons around her was palpable; she could hear it in the rustle of wings and tails, but she had to think of herself right now. Eventually, they’d cool down and understand. She gave them all an apologetic smile and jogged to catch up to Lucifer on unstable legs._

_Ungracefully, she reached out and took his hand. If he was surprised by her action, he didn’t show it, taking her bag from her before he pulled her along behind him._

Now seated in the doorway of his bathroom, his desk chair’s back firmly pressed against the frame of the archway, Lucifer waited for the human to finish cleansing herself.

A shoe resting on his knee, while he faced the other side of the doorframe, Lucifer had unlocked his D.D.D. in relative comfort. It wouldn’t matter that he wasn’t keeping an eye on the human; his hearing was enough.

He’d been pleased that on the way to his room, she’d only stumbled once. She’d given him no push back when he’d steered her toward the bathroom either, only failing to let go of his hand along the way. Small mercies. At least they were until she’d made her way back to his side, stubbornly refusing to look at him.

“ _Tsk, tsk_. We have to stop doing this,” he’d said while taking in her red face and uncomfortably averted gaze. She’d turned without a word and he cut the nightgown from around her wounds. The ridiculousness that this human led them into seemed to be infinite.

A small “thank you,” reached him as she’d retreated, and he’d returned to his previous position, where his displeasure continued to gather the longer he read through the reports.

Soon enough, she was damp, mostly clean, and at his side again. He hadn’t expected to nearly be able to see down her bed clothes when he stood up, but her annoyance was as clear as his surprise was hidden.

“This was all there was in the drawer, Lucifer. Don’t give me that look. You can take it up with Asmo.”

The beginnings of his glare pinned her in place. He most certainly was not giving any sort of look!

“Much better,” she said. “Your ‘I’m-about-to-lecture-you’ face is more familiar.”

Scoffing at her, he loosened his tie and pulled it off himself, only to loop it round her hand and tighten it at the wrist. “Stay in the chair or I will tie you to it,” he said. His words matched the strength he used to tighten the tie, just shy of painful.

“What, you don’t want to chase me through the hallways naked, Lucifer?” she asked, her delivery deadpan as she bent her arm, inspecting the red warning now attached to it. She looked up at him, eyes unflinching. “I’ll sit here, but I can’t promise I won’t fall asleep. So, if you want a report from me too you’ll have to be quick.”

He would not sink to chastising the injured and addled. With a pat to the top of her head, he stepped past her. The frown of confusion she gave at his show of familiarity matched his feelings perfectly.

Walking further into the bathroom, he refused to look at his mutinous hand lest she find evidence of his own bewilderment.

As he turned on the shower and stepped in, he debated just how she managed to draw out reactions so easily from members of his household. She didn’t spend her days murmuring Celestial speech to his subordinates, so what was it that kept them under her thumb? Other than Satan, each of them had been receptive to her orders, if a bit restless, and even Satan she’d managed to placate.

He looked over at the wastebasket next to the sink and the bloody gown that peeked over its rim. It was no longer instinctual for him to offer kindness or comfort; so, what had possessed his hand to give it without his conscious permission?

His contemplations ended as he adjusted his hearing to the water around him and tuned-in to something akin to singing. Looking to the entrance, his nails bit into his palms. It seemed she was intent on taking even the smallest opportunities to oppose him. Of course she wouldn’t sit on the damn chair!

With a sigh, he unclenched his fists. At least if she didn’t adhere to the letter of his orders she was obeying the intent and still in sight. He continued showering as he listened to her hum, using her hands for percussion against the floor where she sat.

Sharp snarls were drawing close, and somehow from all directions. Without delay, he rushed to her side, his feet silent on the tile.

“Prepare yourself,” he said from behind her.

“Ah! Lucifer!” she said, her voice an alarmed chirp. Her arm wouldn’t lift properly to shield her view. “You’re naked! And dripping everywhere!” Ungracefully, she crawled away, her knees knocking loudly on the wooden floor beneath her.

He was ready to stalk after her, but stopped when he spied the owners of the invading voices. With the beginnings of a new hunt halted, Lucifer observed the ridiculousness of it all. A huff of laughter left him, and her scuttling retreat ended with her still facing away from him.

Pushing the wet hair from his eyes to better watch the Little Demons parade after her, he observed as their grabby, black talons opened and closed. The little greed demons tumbled upside down in their haste, nearly catching their yellow, spiraled horns against the floor.

“Return to your seat and let me know if you are expecting visitors,” he said, only the smallest measure of his exasperation slipping out, as if he were reminding Mammon for the hundredth time not to leave his shoes in front of the main door, not complaining about surprise demons in his bathroom.

Returning to the shower and rinsing the soap from his hair and stinging eyes, he watched her return to her place, seated at the foot of the chair, and avoiding the puddles he’d made.

Deep scratches covered her back, and dipped under the black, satin romper. They were obvious even from his clouded vantage point. More inane humming, and more tapping came from her, but what confused him was how quickly the Little Demons came and went. Clearly, she wasn’t commanding them, and they weren’t doing any tasks when they arrived. What was she up to?

Lucifer stood there under the water, having given up bathing in favour of observing the strange human routine that was unfolding before him. She would coo over the Little Demons before reaching into her bag. It was difficult to tell what she gave them, but they were all small items, because they were quickly shielded from view by their clawed, black hands.

A flash of green at her side caught his eye and Lucifer recognized one of the mysterious pouches she had removed from her room. Small, shiny objects made their way from it and into the hands of quickly disappearing demons. Soon enough, a new melody and rhythm came from her corner, bringing another troop of Little Demons. One of Satan’s minions strutted away with a tiny book. The last item was clearly a metal puzzle of some variety.

When she brought out the largest pouch, Lucifer leaned to one side, trying to get a better glimpse of its contents without leaving the stream of hot water. He watched her peek into his bedroom before bringing it near her belly. She covered it the way a vulture would a carcass, hiding it from prying eyes.

A loud crinkle sounded under her hands and she immediately looked back out as if expecting the sound to bring calamity. Little Demons hopped up and down at her side until they received a prize each and she shooed them away.

It took all of his restraint not to laugh aloud at her antics. A chip bag of all things!

Her hand flew to the leg of the chair behind her as a growl thrummed through the air and a knock came at the door. He expected her to flee at the tenor, possibly even flee towards him. Instead, he watched her tense at the first touch of the sound, and then relax into it. Very interesting.

“We have a visitor,” she called back to him, her sing-song intonation telling him what she thought of his orders.

“It’s Belphegor,” Lucifer said, his voice flat. “You can answer the door, but stay in the room. He continued after a moment of thought. “And within his eyesight!” Knowing her, she’d still find a way to go missing.

Tugging off the red tie from around her wrist, she dropped it next to her bag, and rose from her seat, leaving his view.

* * *

It was more effort to stand back up than she’d expected. She thought, then, of all of the empty potion bottles she’d tried to ignore, scattered on the floor of her room, as she had climbed into her bed after Beelzebub. Perhaps she shouldn’t be surprised.

Making her way to the door felt similar to the time Belphegor had slowed the world around her, as if a mantle of lethargy had slipped over her shoulders and covered her limbs. “Coming,” she called out, trying to project some modicum of pep after the day’s events. Was it still today or was this tomorrow now?

Her reaction confused her and she dropped the false energy as quickly as it had come up.

As soon as she opened the door, Belphegor’s hands reached for her, caging her hands between his own. “Come here,” he said gently, but he didn’t pull her forward, not like he often would when abducting her for a nap.

“I’m not allowed to leave the room,” she said, her eyes communicating the same apology as when she’d left all of them in the hallway.

“Then I'll just have to come in,” he said as she stepped back. His hands never left hers, but he seemed to be mindful of giving her a modicum of personal space.

She had tensed, expecting to be captured in one manner or another, but he remained relaxed, warming her hands between his. It was unlike him. Usually, he’d invade her space at a speed only Asmodeus could match.

His expression only caused her more confusion. It wasn’t often she caught him without either a frown or a smile, but she couldn’t make heads or tails of his mood now. The way he looked at her, glancing away and back, was the only thing that betrayed any turmoil.

Would he leave her waiting for an explanation? Belphegor’s verbal communication only came in two flavours: blunt or secretive. Either she would know tonight what he was feeling or nothing at all.

It was likely that he was upset, like the others, that she was in Lucifer’s room again, but it could be anything else as well given that he was still in his demonic form.

When he slowly moved to his knees and wrapped his arms around her hips, drawing her against him, her sense of deja vu was strong, except this time it wasn’t Beelzebub clinging to her.

“I never should have left you,” he said, his words low and full of ache.

She smoothed her fingers through his hair, sliding her fingers past his temples and under his horns, uncertain of what to say as he looked up at her. Unlike Beelzebub, there were no tears, but Belphegor’s voice sounded thick with them.

Too much had happened today for her to attempt emotional support. What was either of them even supposed to be feeling now?

“I was so relieved when I saw you step into the hallway. I didn’t even care that you were in Beel’s arms before mine. I was just happy to see you both safe,” he said, squeezing her a little tighter, emphasizing his sentiments with a growl against her stomach. His words faded to a whisper as he nuzzled her small night clothes. “I was so worried. I’m sorry I left you. I never should have left your side.”

When he looked up at her again, his mask had broken, and she could have lost herself in the pink and purple current of his eyes. This was the Belphegor who had chipped away at her fear and befriended her over the course of months, the one who could put aside everything to apologize and atone. Here was the demon who’d said, “Would you like to make me yours?” and blushed when she’d ask him to say it again.

“I won’t fight with Mammon anymore. Not unless he forces me to,” he said, his palms sliding flat against her sides, fingers extended away from her with the tension and energy of his sincerity. “I know I’ve been stubborn and selfish, but...”

She blinked down at him with a soft smile. “Thank you,” she said. Her sleepy mind was taking in sensation more than his words. His reactions seemed honest. More open than usual. “You’re going to have to be less—what did you call it?” she asked, pausing to think, letting the corners of her mouth twitch upwards at the memory. “Less territorial.”

Brushing the hair away that had fallen back over his eyes, she felt the lines of worry on his forehead, and snippets of Satan’s anthologies came to her, trying to bring all of her floating feelings into some semblance of order. _I threw myself to the wolves, only to learn of the tenderness in their howl, and the loyalty in their blood._ That was what this felt like. Was there an emotion for that?

Quickly standing, Belphegor ran his hands over the goosebumps on her arms, repeating the action as he spoke. “If it means I can keep you close to me…” His eyes unfocused before snapping back to her. “Then I will work with you on that.”

She could see the brief anxiety that accompanied his words: the pull of his shoulders inward, wrinkled brow, and the smallest twitch of his mouth. They disappeared so quickly she almost could have believed she’d imagined them.

“I’ll take that as an I’ll-stop-being-a-jerk-but-you-might-have-to-point-it-out-sometimes,” she said, moving her weight from foot to foot to fend off her impending shivers.

He winced openly at her words before nodding.

He hated being called on his bullshit, but that wasn’t surprising when they all let him get away with murder.

“We need to get you cozy before you freeze to death in this cell,” he said, hugging her carefully as his tail slipped back outside the open door. “Come on.” He stepped around her and delicately lifted her up, mindful of her collection of small wounds. “I can’t believe Lucifer lets you walk around with wet hair.”

Colour tried to rush to her cheeks but she sunk into the care of his hold instead, forgetting about the buzz of indignation and intrigue under her skin in favour of relaxing against his warm body.

Was he going to steal her away now? She couldn’t muster the energy to care what sort of game of keep-away would ensue.

It was a pleasant surprise when Belphegor carried her over to Lucifer’s bed instead. A bit of calm would be nice.

Pausing at the foot of the bed, he grimaced before turning around to sit, taking her into his lap instead of setting her on the mattress.

“It’s barely damp,” she said, then her voice pitched lower as she poked him in the cheek. “You’re being silly.” The words and finger were playful, but her expression said she knew his thoughts as he guarded her against something as benign as Lucifer’s mattress.

“Alright. Alright,” he relented with a weak sigh of defeat. Standing, he turned and set her down in his place.

She could tell he was trying to keep his sour feelings from showing; the way his hands hovered around her and twitched once before pulling away told her of his attempt at restraint.

It wasn’t until she leaned her weight back onto her hands that she noticed a basket trailing behind Belphegor, dangling off the ground by his tail.

His eyes followed her gaze, and he set the basket down, kneeling to dig into it. “I figured you’d want some comfort items since you’ll be staying in this spartan prison with only a skeleton for decent company.”

She smiled against her better judgement. Lucifer could leave the shower at any moment and she was trying not to piss him off, but Belphegor’s debasement of him amused her to no end. The Formerly Anti-Lucifer League wouldn’t be nearly as snarky without him.

As if to contrast his bitter words, he pulled out a soft, thick blanket, handing it to her rather than wrapping her in it. If there was one thing he was always considerate about, it was comfort.

This room was just like Lucifer, sharp edges and splendor. No pillow nests and cocoa here.

Belphegor slid her lost slippers back onto her feet, stealing away her attention from his sass.

She tried to find an interesting spot to stare at on the wall, working to tame the heat that finally rose to her cheeks. Images tumbled in her head: little bits of Cinderella stories, clashing and mixing with the different inflections of his voice when he'd called her Princess.

Sleep was definitely in order.

Curiosity getting the better of her, she watched him dig deeper into the demonic Mary Poppins bag instead of crawling into the bed.

“I managed to retrieve your D.D.D.” he said, handing it to her. “Unfortunately, you are all out of robes.”

She expected a dark and promising quip about how she wouldn’t need it with him, but none came; instead he pulled out a sports drink bottle.

“Three out of seven demons agreed that you should hydrate.”

An unladylike snort left her, “I would’ve thought Satan would ignore your asking.’

“Asmo and Beel,” he said, with a small smile when he saw her regain some of her usual animation.

Both the smile and energy faded from her quickly. “How...how mad is he?”

“Beel is...” Belphegor touched his stomach. “He’s pretty upset. He’ll need some time to cool down.”

She nodded. It wasn’t as though she could hope for more than that after running away from Beelzebub's protection. No, it wasn’t even as innocuous as that. She’d commanded him away from her.

Her shoulders rose towards her ears as the sound of the shower disappeared. ‘No more hassle tonight please?’ she begged the ceiling, praying to the void.

“Asmo?” she asked aloud, trying to pull her thoughts back to the matters at hand and away from the wet demon in the room adjacent to them.

“You’ve got your D.D.D., you’ll have to ask him yourself. Although, if his eyes were any indication, his bloodlust still hasn’t died down.” Belphegor handed her a bar of chocolate. “Try to eat some of this before you fall asleep.”

“Then how are you?” she asked, putting the chocolate bar down on the bedspread.

He pressed his lips together, thinking about his words before he bent back to the basket. Still on his knees, he pulled out his cow patterned pillow and brandished it at her. “Here.”

Hesitantly, she took it from him.

“You have to stop getting hurt,” he said, his eyes focused on the pillow instead of her. “I expect you to give that back to me every morning.”

His blush was such a rare treasure. She was almost as powerless against it as Beelzebub’s puppy eyes. “Okay, then I will work with you on that.”

Belphegor’s determined gaze left the pillow and he rolled his eyes in recognition of her parotting his own words back at him. “Always messing with me,” he said with warmth in his voice, “but far too daring for your own good.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” Lucifer said, as he stepped out of the bathroom and walked past the bed.

Ignoring Lucifer and the towel slung low around his hips, she looked up and to the right, waiting until she heard him open the door to his walk-in closet.

Slowly, Belphegor reached back into the basket, his eyes never leaving hers once he had her full attention again. He brought a finger to his mouth in a shushing gesture, and a new conspiracy was born.

Tacos.

“Beel saved two for you,” Belphegor whispered, glancing over his shoulder before he passed the container to her. “Try to get crumbs _everywhere_. I made sure to pick the crunchiest ones.”

This time she laughed loudly, clutching the pillow tightly over her stomach.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I threw myself to the wolves, only to learn of the tenderness in their howl, and the loyalty in their blood - Isra Al-Thibeh


	80. RHC

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The RHC begin recruiting with the worst timing.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th, the early hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more a ginormous thank you to Dalektable for her hard work in editing this for me!

_Before they could resume their disagreement, or work through the nuances of wording, Mammon gave orders. “Levi, contact Barbatos directly. We need to know why he didn’t see any of this coming. Asmo, do another sweep of the perimeter, with special attention to the pool. Nothing slips through. Satan, return to your potion making, we may need them soon. Beel—”_

_A loud knock at the front door echoed through the house._

_The brothers’ hackles rose and wings fluttered._

_“Sorry, she said she wanted to order tacos,” Beelzebub said with a shrug, before getting up from his seat. “I’ll be right back.”_

_Everyone stared dumbly as he walked away._

_“It’s a hassle, but I have a package to put together before I can sleep,” Belphegor said, standing and stuffing his hands in his pockets as he followed Beelzebub out of the common room doors._

* * *

“What will you be doing?” Leviathan asked their second in command, breaking the awkward silence left in the wake of the twins’ retreat.

“I…” Mammon stroked his chin. “I will wait for Lucifer to submit her debriefing report, and I’ll read through it before I sleep.”

“That’s likely to take quite some time, even if Lucifer isn’t patient with her,” Satan said, his own patience in surprising abundance today. “He may give it in person to Diavolo, along with his own, tomorrow morning rather than share it.”

Their older brother shook off their concerns. “Quit standing around and get to work,” he said, but he tossed the words out limply, hoping they’d land as they should.

It was clear to Leviathan that Mammon wanted them to drop it, but he might not do anything at all if they left him to his self-flagellation.

“I’m going to go make the rounds,” Asmodeus said, choosing his words with care. “Why don’t you two talk to Mammon about that _thing_ you mentioned.”

Immediately, Leviathan and Satan found themselves under intense scrutiny.

“Is there something you didn’t add in your reports?” Mammon asked, standing quickly while Asmodeus made his escape.

“No, everything necessary is in the reports,” Leviathan said, with his hands up in front of him, intent on pacifying.

“Then what?”

“We’ve noticed that…” Leviathan said, before looking uncomfortably to Satan for help as he floundered.

Satan’s figure was backlit by the fire; his silhouette moved its hands in deep sweeping motions to match the careful delivery of his words. “What Levi is trying to say is that your attraction to our pact holder is obvious, and causing you pain.”

Mammon sat back down heavily and dug the heels of his palms into his eyes. “You don’t know what you’re talkin’ ’bout, so mind your own business.”

Carefully, Satan and Leviathan moved closer to where Mammon was seated, with his hunched forward at an uncomfortable angle as he ignored them to fidget with his D.D.D. charm once more.

“We—we’re not judging. We just want to help,” Leviathan said. His delivery was weak, but his confidence grew with each word. They could do this!

“I told you to mind your own business, small-fry. You’ve got your assignment.”

“Mammon,” Satan said, before Leviathan could answer. “You’re becoming too erratic. If we don’t solve this together, you’ll be relieved of duty. You can’t protect her if that happens.”

Baleful, golden eyes snapped up from their distraction, destroying Satan’s shadows with the light that glowed from them. “I will _always_ protect her.” The faint smell of ozone permeated the air around them.

“And how are you going to do that? I can see the gears grinding in your peabrain,” Satan said, his right hand falling to his hip, jutting out his elbow as he stood taller. “You’re thinking you’ll do whatever you need to do, but you’ll eventually ignore the wrong order, or break the wrong rule, or kill the wrong person, and be imprisoned for treason. You think you’ll break out and still save the day. Right?”

Satan waited for an answer.

“I don’t need ta justify myself to you,” Mammon said, looking away only to find Leviathan at his other side. Awkwardly, he stared ahead, uncomfortable looking at either of them.

“Let me put it a way you can better understand. She will be safer if we all work together than if you’re trying to protect her while evading the entire kingdom under threat of your own personal Wild Hunt.”

Satan stuffed his hands into his pockets to hide his clenching fists when all he received in return was stony silence.

Leviathan sat down, closer to Mammon than he wanted to be. “Just...listen,” he said, holding his hands close to his chest, palms facing out as if expecting to be shoved away. “You don’t have to change anything you’re _doing_ , we just need to help you change your perception.”

There was still a lack of eye contact from Mammon and he hadn’t said anything, but Leviathan saw that his leg muscles were no longer flexed to outrun their words at a moment’s notice.

“It’s like you have ten thousand Grimm, but right now you only think it’s worth enough to buy one of Madam Scream’s chocolate bars instead of ten new manga. We need to help you, um, re-learn market value,” Leviathan said, hoping that his rehearsed words landed as intended. His tail twitched against his ankle.

Still no answer, but Mammon had stopped rubbing the charm between his thumb and forefinger. The tension of his shoulder and jaw had lessened slightly, and he surreptitiously assessed Leviathan from the corner of his eye.

“Levi’s right,” Satan said, picking up on the new tactic. “Right now you’re focused on losing, and losing out; we need to re-focus you to start perceiving the current benefits of having, and sharing.”

This time Mammon did turn. His eyes narrowed suspiciously, but they no longer brimmed with unchecked magic.

“We all enjoy eating dinner together,” Satan said, his left hand rising to touch his chest, “even when you make instant noodles. We bicker, but we do actually _enjoy **sharing**_ the meal together. It’s better than eating alone. There is added value in sharing.”

“I’m following,” Mammon said, “You’re trying to convince me to portion out protection of her as if she’s some sort of condo timeshare?”

“Er, maybe?” Leviathan said, his voice high. “No,” he said firmly when he saw Mammon’s jaw clench. “More like, you could have all eight bowls of noodles alone, but the meal wouldn’t be as good as eating it together.” He could feel the blush colouring his cheeks, and he struggled to keep from running from the room. Eating probably wasn’t the best metaphor.

Mammon’s suspicious gaze turned fully on to Leviathan. He was oblivious to many things, but this was not one of them, and Leviathan knew he was the weak link that could give them away before it was time.

“You’re not just talking about protecting her, are you.” It wasn’t a question.

Eyes wide at the quiet accusation, Leviathan tried to school his face back to something less obvious.

D.D.D. abandoned in his lap, Mammon looked forward again, nodding to himself. He pursed his lips as he breathed deeply, clearly looking for the right words. Hopefully, calm words.

“We all know I’m scum. I know that I can’t protect her alone, not with things as they are, but I can tell you’re not just talkin’ about protecting her. You’re not as subtle as you think.” He sucked at his teeth, creating a loud click.

Even in his embarrassment and anxiety, Leviathan could tell this was not normal for Mammon. Just how hurt had she been for Mammon to drop out of tsundere mode? He shouldn’t have skipped Beelzebub’s medical notes.

His tail curled around his ankle.

“You know that feeling you get when your heart is breaking, like all the butterflies in your stomach just died?” Mammon asked. “That’s what it felt like when I watched Beel kiss her tonight.”

They were both quiet, uncertain whether he’d share more. They’d expected that he’d continue denying that she was anything to him, that it would take longer to get to this point. They hadn’t planned this far ahead.

“But there’s nothing I can do. She told me as much and I’m stuck. I can’t not be greedy about her, but she’ll disappear completely if I do.” Mammon leaned into the low back of the couch, letting his head tilt over the edge.

There were several breaths where none of them spoke, until finally, Satan cleared his throat. “Thank you for clarifying your ideas on losing,” he said, sitting down on Mammon’s other side. “What if you look at it this way: if you share her affection…” he said, continuing only once a raised eyebrow from Mammon ensured he was still listening, “then you’ll have decades of time to spend with her instead of none, and you will likely garner _more_ affection for it. It’s become fairly obvious that things have been...strained lately between you two, and not just from your side.”

In the flickering light of the fire, the way Mammon frowned at Satan made heavy thunderclouds of his brow ridge as it furrowed.

“To be fair,” Leviathan said, “We don’t like leaving her with Lucifer either. I would leave him out of building our walkthrough.”

Satan squinted at the description, but halted his question for clarification when he saw Mammon nodding, this time in agreement.

“I’m just not sure what to do about Belphie, though,” Mammon said. “He’s…” He strummed his fingernails forcefully against the back of his D.D.D, struggling to find the right words. “Manipulative?”

“But to protect what he believes in,” Satan said softly.

“Untrustworthy?” Mammon tried again.

“Not when it comes to important things,” Leviathan said. His hand hovered, about to touch Mammon’s knee, but quickly withdrew.

“Crafty?”

“Always,” they said, each murmuring it with varying levels of animosity.

“Oh, are we talking about Belphie? We already knew about that,” Asmodeus’ voice rang out from the doorway as he sauntered towards them. “Seems like she’s doing just fine without our little club.”

“WHAT?” Mammon asked, standing abruptly.

“Well, you didn’t think Beel would go anywhere without Belphie, did you?”

“Why do you think I dragged him outside? That little shitmagnet was supposed to tell me when she was healed!” Mammon said, throwing his hands up in the air and walking around the couch. “He offered to keep Beel in check! Instead, I come in and he’s on top of her, getting his slobber all over her!”

“How about we wrap things up,” Satan said, trying to drive the point of their conversation past the newest hurdle.

“How long has this been going on?” Mammon asked as he paced. The distress in his tone and speed of his words rose as he continued. “How can I keep her safe if I don’t know what’s happening with her? We just had this talk!”

“Hmm,” Asmodeus said, a hand on his hip, and the other inspecting his nails in the low, flickering light. “I’d say they’ve been fucking at least a week, but honestly, it’s hard to tell. Ever since she first started napping together with him instead of just in the same room, he’s been impossible to remove from her side.”

Leviathan nodded. Asmodeus was right. When had Belphegor not been near her other than at R.A.D? Only when she’d specifically made herself off limits to spend time with someone else. “Like a stubborn limpet.”

Mammon dropped back on to the couch, and put his head into his hands, planting his elbows on his knees. “He’s always there to grocery shop, bake, listen to music, nap. He hasn’t been this alert for anything in centuries,” he said, a tense whine tinging each activity listed with his exasperation. “Why didn’t I notice?”

“You two aren’t helping,” Satan said, pointing to Mammon’s quickly collapsing form.

“It’ll never work!” Mammon said, sitting up with dry eyes. “I still want to pummel him. More now than before.”

“Let’s ignore matters of the heart for now,” Satan said, easing a thread out of the tangled ball of emotions, “and focus just on protection.”

“Fine. I won’t try and protect her by myself.” Mammon said, his hands flying outward, nearly smacking the two on either side of him.

“To do that, you can’t be getting jealous and going off the deep end,” Leviathan said, trying to look serious. ‘Like I have much room to talk. I almost drowned her the day before yesterday.’

Mammon looked like he was struggling to swallow a grapefruit, all willpower and purple-faced. ”How do you expect me to do that?” he asked, snapping at them.

“Really, weren’t you sharing her already before this all started? Before you were fully aware?” Satan asked. “If nothing has changed drastically, then you should be able to go back to the comfortable way you interacted before. To the same amount of time you spent together before.”

Mammon flexed his hands and stood up again, and whatever machinations he thought they had planned.

“What I’m hearing from your silence,” Asmodeus said to his retreating back, “is that yes, you were already sharing her, you just weren’t ready to admit it to yourself.” His look was knowing, as the words struck at Mammon. “Want a little help from Asmo?”

Mammon stopped fleeing the room, turning to level his gaze on Asmodeus before he stomped back to the center of the room. Drawing up to his full height, he managed to loom over Asmodeus without using his wings. “What did you mean by ‘club?’”

“You know, I would love to stay and chat about this, but I think I hear Belphegor calling from the kitchen,” Asmodeus said. “I’m just going to make sure he adds an electrolyte drink to that ‘package’ I saw him creating.”

The couch did not survive the pressure of the energy that leaked out of Mammon. Its legs snapped loudly, distracting him, and giving Asmodeus the chance to run.


	81. Debriefing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC is left alone with Lucifer.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th, the early hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, massive thank you to Dalektable, who took time out of her crazy busy schedule to look this chapter over.

_“Beel saved two for you,” Belphegor whispered, glancing over his shoulder before he passed the container to her. “Try to get crumbs everywhere. I made sure to pick the crunchiest ones.”_

_This time she laughed loudly, clutching the pillow tightly over her stomach._

* * *

Belphegor certainly kept her guessing. With a gentle kiss to her forehead, he slipped out of the room, leaving her with the empty basket, hands full of taco, and a lap covered in comfort items. The fondness for him that had been recently overshadowed by wariness and lust was blooming again in her chest.

“Just what do you think you’re doing?” she heard from across the room.

She raised her eyebrows in surprise at Lucifer’s lack of nightshirt, despite him stepping out of his closet. There’d never been a time when she’d seen him without at least one layer on. Just how many people had seen him shirtless? With the exception of their magic-induced romp she’d never seen so much as a button out of place before. “I was thinking about dragging my bloody nightgown out of the trash to use as an eating shirt,” she said without inflection. ‘In for a penny, in for a pound.’

“You will not be dragging blood, anywhere in this room,” he said as he stormed to his writing desk and dug into one of the deeper drawers. “Here. You will use this.”

He’d moved into her space much faster than she’d expected, and she leaned away from him awkwardly with her hands full, unable to take the tray thrust at her. “You have a writing desk for your bed?” she asked, setting the small container of tacos on it.

Glaring at the food, Lucifer ignored her words. She could see the thoughts going round in his head as his eyes darted to the door.

He balanced the heavy lap desk easily in one hand, and her mind drifted to the week the demons had practiced butling duties. That had been when Mammon had first confessed he wanted something more: something equal. At least before he backtracked for the hundredth time. She wrinkled her nose at the thought.

_ This,  _ however, was definitely not a place where she had equal footing: Lucifer’s bedroom was neutral, at best, but not friendly territory.

“Do you prefer to stand, sit, or lay down during your debriefing?” he asked, still holding the tray.

“I’d prefer to sit for now, and lay down after eating, if it’s all the same to you?” she said, blinking quickly, surprised that he’d asked.

He motioned for her to situate herself, and she kicked off her slippers to crawl the length of the bed. Once sitting in front of the headboard, she was careful not to let her back touch it. It was going to be interesting trying to sleep tonight. 

She looked over at Lucifer who still had yet to find the top of his pajamas. It confused her. Even when fucking her on every surface available in her room, his shirt had only ever come open, her hands never allowed to explore far, or remove it completely. If this evening hadn’t given her enough to think about already, she would have delved into the puzzle piece he was presenting to her, instead she tried to make herself comfortable for her own interrogation ahead. 

Consumables within reach and away from the bedding, a plush blanket to keep the cold at bay, and a cow pillow to shield her legs from the lapdesk, there was nothing else she could possibly need. She was sure those were Lucifer’s thoughts as she watched his attention flit from item to item only to land on her, as if she was going to somehow manifest a new human need if he looked away.

“Start from the beginning,” he said.

“So, Satan called me to his room before I left the house.”

Lucifer sighed and reached forward, pulling open a drawer from her lap desk.

She stuffed her face with taco while he retrieved a pen and pad from her personal space, feigning obliviousness as he did so.

“Actually, maybe we should talk about Mammon first,” she said, after swallowing a large bite.

The quick turn of his head betrayed that she’d captured his interest. “Go on.” His eyes burned their suspicion and judgement into her. 

“He—” she rubbed the back of her neck, just above the scabbing scratches, and looked away. 

“I’m sure you recall how I feel about secrets in my household.”

“Uh, yes...” she said dumbly, licking her dry lips. “He almost lost control today before I left the house. At least, I think that’s what happened? I don’t know…” She looked down at her remaining taco. “He transformed and I had to command him to release me from where he’d pinned me against the wall.”

He watched her chew at the inside of her cheek. “Yes, well, fanged puppies can be difficult to train,” he said. He nodded as if to dismiss her concerns.

Was it a good sign that he wasn’t writing anything down? The avatars’ eyes weren’t mood rings, they were much too complex for that, but they hinted at the demons’ movement of energy, and it was often a game of roulette to guess at what the shifting patterns and light meant, if anything. She’d seen the brief glow of red that rimmed Lucifer’s eyes just now. It had lent a depth to their usual, unreadable black; this was clearly of interest to him even if his words didn’t sound like it. 

“I thought it was just a slip up,” she said, her hand over her diaphragm as it tensed and stuttered her words. She took a deep breath. “But it happened again shortly after as well.” Her hands fidgeted at the corner of the takeout container. “The first time was to try and prove how vulnerable I am, but the second time...” She held her breath for a moment, not wanting to say the words and make them real. “The second time was more personal and on the floor.”

The gradient of red had returned to the lower half of Lucifer’s eyes and this time it didn’t disappear. “I see,” he said.

She licked her lips again. “We mostly made up, but I told him I wasn’t interested in being friends anymore if he couldn’t sort his shit out.” Heaviness was trying to pull at her eyelids but she continued. “Soooo, he might not want to remain as my babysitter.”

“I will speak to him about his behaviour,” Lucifer said, speaking softly.

Maybe he was right to look into it. She’d considered not telling him, and seeing how things would play out, but the intense need she felt to hide Mammon’s loss of control meant she  _ needed _ to tell him. White lies were one thing, but omitting something like this, like her knowledge of Belphegor being imprisoned, those were the types of things that Grisella had warned her would destroy all of the trust she’d built between her and Lucifer.

Maybe her mind was already cracking under the strain of the Devildom. “Alright,” she said, pretending that they both didn’t know there was no promised lack of punishment. “So, Satan called me to his room before I left the house.”

* * *

“How did you know that one of them was leaving for the toilets and that there was a spell on the room?” Lucifer asked her once she’d come to the end of her story.

She lifted the sports drink back to her mouth for time to think. If she were to tell him she could understand much of what they grumbled in the Infernal language, that ace in the hole was gone. It was really the only advantage she had when it came to interpreting them all. 

Setting down the bottle, she flipped him a bras d'honneur.

His slack expression told her he was unimpressed by her emphatic ‘fuck you’.

“I can put together clues and body language,” she said, with a grin. “Sometimes it’s just an impression or funny feeling that I should pay attention.” That wasn’t a lie per say. She broke off a piece of chocolate, needing to look away from her shirtless dictaphone. 

Lucifer’s D.D.D. rang from within his pocket, and she was relieved to finally have his intense scrutiny off of her.

“Lord Diavolo, yes. Thank you...Yes, I have also read through them.”

She ignored their call. If she couldn’t hear Diavolo’s side, then she was unlikely to hear any useful information slip out.

Opening her own D.D.D. she skimmed through her personal messages.

When she was certain Lucifer was deeply absorbed in his ass-kissing, she opened up a different chat.

* * *

**The Demon Brothers (New) Chat (7):**

**Beelzeburger:** Taking the human down to the crypt while Mammon and Belphie spar outside.

**L3VI:** Is _that_ what that noise was?!

**L3VI:** No one tells me these things!

**L3VI:** I was getting ready to build a moat and drown something.

**L3VI:** There’s still time, if you two end up knocking over any of my display cases!

**Not Today Satan:** I thought Lucifer confiscated all of your figurines until you finished your intelligence work?

**L3VI:** I finished information collection, and reclaimed Dragon Cavalry Ruri-chan and her limited edition poses for each season.

**L3VI:** Just working on analysis and PR now.

**Not Today Satan:** Do you need to spell off to get more food, Beel?

**Beelzebuger:** No, I’ve got this.

**L3VI:** You sure?

**Beelzeburger:** Have you secured Ruri-chan?

**L3VI:** Just said you’re still worried and want human hugs. Don’t bring Ruri-chan into this!

**Not Today Satan:** *Eyeroll Demoji* I’m upstairs if you need anything. 

**Not Today Satan:** You make being helpful a real pain in the ass.

* * *

She was sure they had a number of other chats that she couldn’t eavesdrop on, but this one always annoyed her. While they called her family, they still hid things from her there. It made sense, and she understood; they had abilities and responsibilities that she didn’t, but it still stung. ‘Maybe that really does make me family,’ she thought. They were always hiding things from one another. Then again, who was she to talk? She’d never told them that she could see their private messages either. ‘Oh. Oh no. If I can see these...’ 

“Good. Knowing Satan, he’ll forward his conclusions shortly,” Lucifer said, his voice cutting through her thoughts. “Yes, we are just completing that now. Please expect me early tomorrow to follow up in person.” 

His pen was back and his D.D.D. gone before she could blink. “So, after you broke your ankle, and had fully dislocated your hip, you then proceeded to burn the eyes out of your third attacker before I got to you?”

“Y-yes?” she said, her mind elsewhere, busy figuring out what her viewership meant for the security of the network.

“You neglected to mention why you did not reveal to me the extent of your injuries.”

She knew she looked like a deer in headlights. “Shock?”

“Mhmm,” he said, clearly not impressed. “Do you realize that Satan used 13 potions on you in addition to Beelzebub’s healing?”

“That many? They can’t have been full—”

“Yes, they were full strength,” he said, crushing her argument and watching her squirm as her cheeks stained red with guilt. 

“Will I be able to check on them all tomorrow morning?” she asked, turning her D.D.D. over in her hands.

“They are demons. They will be fine.” 

“You say that, but I don’t think any of you have been fine in a very long time,” she said, her voice barely loud enough for him to hear.

His glare halted any further foolish statements, but it didn’t change the sadness her body language portrayed. 

He flipped the notepad closed and stared. Softening his glare to something less repellent, he stood. “That concludes our discussion. Do you have any questions?”

She slid the lapdesk away, and pushed her feet under the slippery sheets before fixing him with an unsteady stare of her own, her eyelids heavy and blinking unevenly with fatigue. “What did I miss?”

“You are tired. We can go over that in the morning.”

“You can also tell me now.”

“There’s no need,” he said, his face unreadable as he collected the lapdesk from her side. 

“There _ is _ a need because you’re not going to tell me in the morning, are you?” 

Carrying his chair and writing implements to their rightful places, he answered her smothered grunts of discomfort instead of her question. “Are you alright?” 

She had slid further under the sheets to lay on her stomach and sighed loudly, too tired to wring information out of him. “The amount of inappropriate thoughts I have is concerning, but otherwise, yes, I’ll be fine,” she said. “Bodies bounce back. Brain just needs some reboot time to adjust.”

“Ah, yes, the ‘human-reboot,’ which I doubt exists.”

“Are  _ you _ alright?” she asked, overlooking his jibe. 

“Of course I am. A better question is: why aren’t you going to sleep? Usually two potions and you’re out like a candle in a windy corridor.”

She sighed loudly again and wriggled her way onto her side. “Stop being stubborn, and come here, please.”

* * *

The casual way in which she requested his presence nearly stalled his return from the desk rather than hasten it. ‘She did say please,’ he thought, as he moved to the other side of the bed, keeping at least a full wingspan away from her.

“I did say ‘ _ please _ .’”

He dropped the lights completely. “Stop fretting over demons and go to sleep.”

The sound of her scooting closer to him was unmistakable. Easily her best and worst trait was wanting to coddle demons! At least she wouldn’t take an entire hour migrating and settling down this time. 

“How do you not have a single fluffy blanket in here to relax with?” she asked, her voice hushed, and closer to his ear than he’d expected.

“I have no need of ‘fluffy’ blankets, as I do not usually entertain injured humans.”

He could feel her staring into his skull. This was indeed the third time that he’d slept next to her for her health. He refused to give her the satisfaction of hearing him say it.

“Sit up while I’m still conscious,” she said.

For a moment, he wondered how little effort it would take to shake her and induce a brief black out to save him from her poking and prodding. “Do you require assistance?” he asked instead, attempting to keep the iciness from his voice. Why did her fear of him come and go without any discernible pattern?

“Always making things fucking difficult,” he heard her mutter under her breath as he sat up. “Just face away from me,” she said, tiredness the only thing colouring her demeanor in the dark. 

He was shocked when he felt her hands tentatively touch his back. 

A small squeeze to each of his shoulders kept him from airing his thoughts aloud. Instead, he let the tension he didn’t know he was carrying recede as she slowly kneaded the muscles under her hands. “I thought _ I _ was supposed to be consoling you?”

She laughed at him. “I’m not sure consoling is your strong suit.”

Her hands slid over where his third set of wings once existed between the other two pairs, round dips of scar tissue; he said nothing until they continued to press over less sensitive ground. “That’s not what you said last time,” he said, his voice dripping with confidence. He felt her pause when he flexed the muscles under her hands for emphasis.

“Your definition of consoling and mine are very different,” she said softly at his ear.

The diplomacy she used in the dark with him, even while teetering on the cusp of unconsciousness amused him. He let out a soft grunt when she hit a knot with more force than he’d expected from her. Perhaps he shouldn’t have thought she would be able to sleep so soon after reliving the evening’s events. 

“Besides, I don’t need consoling. I’ve killed three demons today and managed eight little deaths,” she said, bracing her knee on his spine to stretch his shoulders back. “So, the good and the bad even out.” Her yawn took away from her bravura.

That explained Belphegor intruding earlier. Clearly, there was more to worry about when it came to her well being than the recent cuts on her back. Her unpredictable behaviour suddenly made more sense. How many times had adrenaline and morphine-like chemicals cycled through her today? 

His muscles spasmed under her thumbs before resolving themselves to be looser. “Rookie numbers,” he said, successfully eliciting laughter from her. He had to admit, it was relaxing like this. She didn’t expect anything of him, and from here the glow of his eyes didn’t create wariness in her.

“Clearly you’re only counting kills,” she said. “Don’t worry though, I won’t let any scary dreams get you tonight, Lucifer.”

He would have mocked her in turn, but her thumbs had found a spot in his neck that made him salivate. “Time for all good humans to go to sleep,” he said, gently catching her hands with his.

“Let me know when you find one,” she whispered to him as though she were letting him in on a momentous secret.

“Get your shiny soul into bed, already,” he said, turning to face her. Not that he gave her a chance to, her hands still caught in his.

She sighed loudly and slid away from him. 

The sound of her getting comfortable was brief, but he waited anyway, suspecting she would shuffle closer in her sleep as she had before. It had happened even when he’d slept in the chair in her room, though she’d found no comfort from him that night as he’d stayed in his seat.

He didn’t need to wait long. By settling down in the middle of the bed, she’d cut her previous travel time in half. Stretching his arm out, he waited for her to get closer. Better to get it over with and let her fall into a deeper sleep sooner rather than later. Diavolo was furious already; inadequate sleep for her would only continue to reflect poorly on them all. 

The night before, when she’d stolen into his bed, he’d been uncertain how she’d ended up sidled against him, who had moved to whom. He hadn’t been willing to shove her away, either. So, he’d shushed her instead. Now, he considered skipping all of that. 

When he felt her hand grasp his in the dark, he only waited a moment before pulling her closer. The satin of her bed clothes slid easily against the same material of his sheets. There was little resistance, but she murmured her discomfort.

A soft rumble of Infernal speech, and she fell back into restfulness. The rush of accomplishment he felt at her instantaneous trust in his true speech was unexpected. It was a warmth spreading in his chest until he remembered how she’d relaxed when Belphegor had called out to her as well.

He wasn’t jealous of such a ridiculous thing. In fact, he scoffed at the notion. The way she’d looked at him when he’d ripped out the throat of her attacker told him everything he needed to know. He’d seen how the paint ‘round her throat had rapidly changed from the sickly metallic green to the darkest of blacks, even before her eyes showed recognition; it meant she knew where she was safest. There was no question.

He frowned, remembering the tears and blood when she’d run from the house. At first, he’d thought she was wounded, but she reeked of smoke, like Beelzebub’s locusts. There had been relief in her face, and then fear again after she’d reached for him. It was impossible to guess how she would respond to him on the best of days. 

After their torrid night together, he’d expected her to be defensive or angry, but other than a blush, and bit of sass, there had been nothing. Instead, when she was weak, she came to his bed to rest.

He uttered another growl to test her reaction, and he watched her stretch slightly and sigh, still relaxed. Different words, different phrases, some of them crude, some threatening, but she didn’t flinch from any of them. What had she said before? He looked down at her. “ _ Your thoughts are beautiful. They all feel brave _ .” She hadn’t said words, she’d said thoughts.

Could she have lied about the extent of her understanding? He growled, thrumming words of safety to her, but nothing additional occurred. He was ready to dismiss the idea completely before he felt her finger twitch in the closed palm of his hand.

“Closer,” he said, pressing the meaning into sound and opening his hand. His low light vision made it possible to watch her arm lift away, never pausing, until her hand rested against his torso.

Maybe she didn’t consciously understand? He took his time c onsidering instances which he'd previously dismissed as luck .

Grappling with a similar discomfort to what he’d shoved away last night, when she’d slept next to him covered in cartoon sea creatures, he cleared his throat. He’d laid awake most of what remained of that night after her unexpected sleep muttering startled him. Since then, he’d been debating on the word choice should the chance to test her arise again. 

What did he want the result to be? Was there an ideal outcome? He breathed deeply, swallowed, and breathed out, disturbing her hair with the force of it. No, to begin with, it was a ridiculous notion.

He closed his eyes. It had been so long since he’d last had a reason to do this. “Safe here, closer,” he said, the sound of it like soft wind through leaves and far away chimes. Rust lined the edges of the meaning, but it was still understandable. It was still enough to be Celestial speech.

Faster than he’d thought possible, she hooked her arm around his middle and pulled herself closer, snuggling her face against his chest while he remained rigid with shock.

Carefully, he let his arms rest around her, mindful of her wounds. Even if politics didn’t dictate they keep her for her own safety, he couldn’t say for sure that any of them would be willing to let her go home at the end of the program now. Everything she’d introduced into their lives couldn’t be undone; they’d be even weaker without her now. 

He hated when Mammon was right.


	82. Lonely Night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Checking in on the boys while they deal with the fall out from the evening and last few days.
> 
> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th, the early hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Massive thank you to Dalektable, who took time out of her crazy busy schedule to look this chapter over and rake me over the coals ;) <3

It was a shock when Asmodeus hadn’t heard footsteps pounding behind him after he fled. A shame. He could use a good chase, a good fight even. The blood hunt had only provided lesser quarry. 

Quietly walking back to his room, Asmodeus let himself in and stormed straight into the bathroom. He wouldn’t mind knocking some sense into that idiot. A good tussle would have taken some of the edge off of this bloodlust too. 

He’d intended on taking a long, relaxing soak when they’d returned from clubbing, hopefully with the delectable human in tow, but it had turned out to be a very different type of night.

Why did she simper over that moron? Asmodeus turned on the shower. Sure, Mammon was charismatic, but he was nothing compared to the Avatar of Lust. It seemed so wrong for her to pine over Mammon when everyone else knew how useless he was. How could she want him when _Asmo_ was right there in front of her?

Fully clothed, he stepped into the shower and let the excess blood flow down into the floor drain. “Who am I kidding?” he said to the empty room. Only the sound of the scorpion and flowers uncurling from his shirt to rinse themselves answered him. He leaned his forehead against the cool wall, wiling away the rigidness of the last of his bloodlust. Images of the cloak room filtered through his mind to plague him, then the bodies on the dance floor. He’d barely heard the instructions for the Wild Hunt before he’d given himself over to the carnage.

Unnecessarily careful with the familiars camouflaged across his shirt, he unbuttoned it and lay it on the floor, directly beneath the hot water. “Already glutted yourselves did you?” he asked the creatures, watching the fabric they crawled over drain off a dark purple. How long had it been since he’d conditioned his garments this way he wondered as he ducked his head under the spray. “Well, you’ll be fattened up and recharged regularly now,” he said, muttering it more to himself than the creatures at his feet.

He watched the golden scorpion preen under the water; its new brilliance should cheer him, but now it was only a badge of his failure. For the first time, he regretted watching the petal-chain arachnids unfurl from their masquerade as his flowers. His familiars were only fattened with blood because he’d failed to keep her next to him. 

He considered that maybe he shouldn’t have provoked Mammon as he washed the blood clots from his hair. If the guilt Mammon felt was anything like his, he was already self-flagellating. Rinsing away the shampoo, he also pushed away thoughts of Mammon. Tomorrow he would check on her. Maybe he’d wear something red.

Finishing his wash, he moved quickly to dry himself and begin his skincare regimen. No point in posting about it. He didn’t have the energy to conjure a bright smile, and she wasn’t likely to see it, not when she was hidden away by Lucifer. He wondered if she was already asleep.

Routine completed without any flourish, he returned to his bedroom and had nothing left to busy his mind. His throat felt tight when he looked at his bed. All he saw when he looked at it were visions of her: whalloping him with pillows, innocent kisses, daydreams and gossip. He hesitated, and then crawled in anyway.

The fantasy he’d created when she greeted his arrival to the house was stuck firmly in his mind. Initially, he’d dawdled, afraid to see her, knowing she’d been injured, and instead she’d floated down toward him, wings blocking out the light above, her dress fluttering around her. His own personal angel had come to welcome him home. 

The black on white of her nightgown had drawn him in, and as she landed in his arms he’d been struck by the relief that flooded him. Squeezing his eyes shut he’d savoured the feeling of her against him.

Asmodeus rolled over, trying to find a comfortable position to sleep, his mind giving his body no rest, even on the softest of sheets. 

He’d flirted with her until her shrieks of pain and terror made him open his eyes to reality, and dozens of Little Demons dispersed, unhooking their claws from one another, and from her flesh with difficulty. Her wings had fallen away, having been made up of demons formed behind her into a complex machine that Terra Firma’s ants would envy. It was one of the few times he’d seen all of the Little Demons work together, even wrath and pride had clasped one another for support to protect their fragile queen. 

And then the spectres found them. He’d made her run and remembered little after that.

Pressing his face into a pillow, he cringed, but even grinding the pillow against his skin didn’t take away the memory of the sickness in his stomach. It hadn’t faded away until he’d found Beelzebub.

The scent of roses around his bed failed to soothe him. He’d had to ask to find out if the sensations he’d enjoyed had been pleasure, or if her torture had been of a different nature.

He fled the confines of his bed, retching as he reached the toilet. 

* * *

Satan heated water in the kettle at his side table, still devoid of books. Keeping the essentials in his room ensured he could maximize his time, but the green tint that left his hands to coax the water to boil only reminded him of how she’d accepted his energy without a trace of resistance. 

The kettle whistled and he stopped exciting the water within. Pouring it into a large mug, he aggressively jigged the silk bag of leaves up and down, waiting for it to steep.

It was a memory that had made him blush and forget which paragraph he’d been reading. At one point, he’d forgotten where he was in the story, losing his place again and again until he’d had to leave for the mausoleum. And now that memory was tainted with the knowledge that it hadn’t been enough, or had been too much.

Alighting on his shoulder, Rancor peered down at his sloppy creation, tea sloshing over the rim and filling the saucer before falling onto the table beneath it. 

“Deathworm piss,” Satan said, hissing the words just under his breath as he tried to be more gentle with his impatient steeping method.

Potion making, at least, kept his attention. It required a steady hand and concentration. There was little need for magic, only herbalism and practice, but now even the weight of a newly filled bottle brought back the sensation of clutching a dozen of them to his chest. 

Those gruesome reports from The Fall sounded like something he would have done. He tried to swallow the tightness in his throat. She was alive, but exploding a scale demon’s chest with his borrowed strength was something she would likely abhor him for. The tremble of his hands as he imagined her letting go, and wreaking havoc, flowed into the rest of his body as a shiver.

When he looked down again, there was almost tea left in the up-ended cup, and Rancor took flight as he swept his hand across the surface of the table, sending his attempt as calming himself crashing over books and melted candles. Tea and ceramic pooled off of the charmed stacks and slipped to the floor.

He sighed and collected his jacket. “I’ll be back in a bit,” he said when Rancor flapped near him again.

Satan tweaked the distillation equipment once more as he headed out the door. The breaking room was going to see more activity than usual he realized as he trudged down a hall that seemed much bleaker than he remembered.

* * *

Mammon had hoped the fresh air would clear his mind, help him sort out the buzzing in his head, but his patrol of the grounds kept reminding him of her.

Walking alongside the hill on which he’d first taken her stargazing, he avoided the moonlight and pulled his power in tightly, hiding from any prying senses. He’d told Lucifer she never should’ve been left in his care. They were right. He was trash. He couldn’t even hold his greed back enough to stay in the same building.’

His path took him along the border of the forest. They’d gone picnicking here, or tried to, for how often he’d gotten them lost. She’d packed extra sandwiches because she’d known Beelzebub would steal the top layer of them before she’d made it out the door.

The trees swayed toward him, and he hastily crushed his leaking power back into himself. She said herself that it was probably just a healing thing, but the sinking feeling in his stomach begged to differ. The image of Beelzebub holding her, plundering her mouth in the hallway without a hint of restraint or resistance between them said differently as well. It might have only been healing at one time, but it wasn’t anymore. He kicked a rock and it flew into the forest, snapping saplings in its path.

Beelzebub at least he could understand, but Belphegor? Belphegor, of all the creatures in the realms, made no sense! He tried to keep from shouting his confusion into the never-ending night. He’d killed her! He had taken her away from Mammon in a way that couldn’t be undone. Belphegor knew how tired she got from healing potions. How could he have the balls to take advantage of her like that? Had he thought Mammon wouldn’t find out?

Mammon took a deep breath of the cool air, looking at the craters he and Belphegor had left behind, the sight of them creating a different kind of anger. Every depression in the ground showed where he had shot wide on purpose or lost accuracy with frustration. It was a perfect example of his life now: either controlling himself and losing, or losing himself in emotion and failing to reach his goals anyway.

Sitting down in the shadow of a crater, he sifted the moist dirt around him from fist to palm and back again. Lucifer was always so proud of how he kept control, even when everything around them was in chaos. What would he think of today’s events? Would he allow Mammon to stay at her side, or would he try to stop him? His shoulders slumped. Maybe she’d be better off with Asmodeus watching over her. Asmodeus had noticed something between her and Belphegor at least a week before Mammon had walked in on it.

Mammon paused the transfer of earth between his hands, remembering the look of her with Belphegor around her: his knee at the apex of her thighs, his arm urging her body to arch under him, his other hand cupping the back of her head as he practically made love to her mouth. It was the look she gave him when she saw him standing in the doorway that stung the most. He’d watched and waited. Even as the recognition came over her, she didn’t push Belphegor away. The only thing that changed was her expression, which went from one of softness and relaxation to heartbreak.

This wasn’t helping. Mammon got up and dusted himself off, using his wings to hop and flap to the edge of the crater, sending bits of dirt and debris off of him as he accelerated.

Would she even want his protection after looking at him like that? He’d already told the others he would watch over her no matter what, but she had a way of finding loopholes he’d never considered. Was all of this just a powerplay? Could Belphegor love her as much as he did, without hurting her again or worse? Mammon growled in frustration. He didn’t even know if Asmodeus was right about how intimate they’d been together and he couldn’t keep flying off the handle and assuming. It only drove her further away.

Making his way through the back garden, he listened for any sound inside the house. All was silent except for a distinct pulsing emanating from the outbuilding. It was better not to disturb Satan. He didn’t want to add _that_ tantrum to his night, not when he already had to think about how to deal with their little club. 

Mammon prodded at the physical and magical properties of the exterior pool room walls, testing for weaknesses. ‘Share her?’ he wondered, ‘There’s too little to share. She’s too precious. Too fragile.’ 

The scent of salt water and mud was strong here. His boots were making more noise in the muck than his wings would, and he took flight, hovering a few feet from the ground. Were they right though? Wasn’t he already sharing her affection, just not her bed? He looked out towards the lake. He remembered her tender touches, her promises to keep him.

The wildlife ignored him as he continued to check over the property, leaving the pool and garden behind. At least she’d told him about Beelzebub, Touching down to the ground again, it seemed weeks ago that he had tested her use of the pact and kissed her desperately into the floor, but it had only been hours. Actual weeks before, she had been dying in his arms, and apparently he had been fading from her heart since then. Hadn’t she said she still wanted him? Even after she stopped their kiss. Shame washed through him, burning hot under his cheekbones and draining into his chest. He never should have touched her like that! Why didn’t he ever think? It seemed impossible that after everything, she’d also forgiven his failure to protect her.

Dew from the tall grass dripped into his boots, chilling his feet. The soles squelched softly but he kept walking. Would she actually be interested in that sort of arrangement? His stomach tumbled and lurched at the idea. Belphegor and Beelzebub were a package deal, but was that what she wanted, or just something she put up with for Beelzebub’s sake. She was too nice. She’d likely try even if she was uncomfortable.

Meeting the edge of the forest again, he could see the lake shining in the middle of it all and continued the other half of his circling route. The image of her surprise was haunting him as he patrolled. Her brows had knit together before drawing up slowly, and her had eyes started to well up, as her lips made a surprised ‘o.’ It was burnt into the backs of his eyelids. 

He was sure it was Beelzebub that had kept her from following. She was never one not to meddle.

Why couldn’t she just tell him about Belphegor if Asmodeus was right and they were “together?” The night air did nothing to cool the heat that still pressed down into his cheekbones. Probably because he’d worry, but of course he’d fuckin’ worry! Belphegor killed her! Before all this, it took everything Mammon had not to pull her away every time Belphegor touched her or even looked at her for too long!

He took another deep breath, letting it out slowly in a stream of warm vapour. How could she forgive him when he hadn’t yet? The front gate was quickly coming into view, and nothing had seemed suspicious yet. They’d have to make regular rounds from now on.

Pausing at the front gate, Mammon looked out onto the empty street. Unseeing and enthralled by his turmoil, all of his senses automatically continued to stretch out into the night, following a checklist created by centuries of practice. 

How was he supposed to weigh the value of a “family meal” against "lonely noodles" if part of the table was on fire? Turning back to the house, he looked up, scanning the rooftops again. They were both awful choices.

No winged creatures or vermin skittered despite the wee hours, as if they knew something terrible approached, and Mammon took a seat on the front stairs, messaging the main chat that all was clear for now. He stayed there for a time, looking up at Lucifer’s tinted windows, wondering if she was alright, if she was asleep yet, if she’d actually forgiven him. 

Finally, he turned in. He’d promised to sleep in her bed tonight. That wouldn’t change just because she wasn’t in it yet.

* * *

Leviathan collected corks and bottles from her room, blushing when he picked up her filthy dress. He couldn’t let her come back to this in the morning. There weren’t any figurines that he had to be mindful of, nor special editions to be dusted, just the smell of leaves and blood. 

She’d been so beautiful at dinner. She was always pretty, but she never dressed to provoke reactions, not unless Asmo was involved. Dropping wet towels and clothing into the hamper, his cheeks darkened with admiration and guilt.

He’d watched Asmodeus escort her down to dinner as he quickly hid himself around the hall corner. Just the sight of her skin made him remember how she’d been covered in sea creature tattoos, worn just for him through last night and early that morning. He’d rocketed between smugness and jealousy until he could find a balance of uncertain want and embarrassment. No one had been surprised when he’d left breakfast early.

Shots of shame and lust had streaked through him when he’d spied the red pigment ringing her neck and wondered how much the paint would darken as her body heated. That wasn’t how he was supposed to react to his Henry! He’d retreated to his room, barely able to eat his stash of snacks as he distracted himself with online reviews. 

Then he couldn’t eat at all, not even his limited edition Azuki-tan buns. The untouched Valentine’s chocolates in their mauled box judged him even more harshly after his mind finally registered the yellow underneath her painted, red choker.

He’d busied himself with software and driver updates until her message asking to talk distracted him. What should he say? _“Sorry I almost killed you and then kissed you? Thanks for leaving before I woke up after we fell asleep together again?”_

Pausing his cleaning, Leviathan directed a few Little Demons to the laundry facilities. They would need to prepare a mop solution and something to soak the bloodied fabrics in at the very least. 

His hand twitched and he pulled out his D.D.D, intent on reliving a nicer part of their evening. Even if she did practically torture him during it.

**b357fr13nd5 Chat (2):**

**MC:** I thought you made dinner tonight? Aren’t you going to join us?

 **MC:** *Questioning Demoji*

 **MC:** You’re not avoiding me again, are you?

She never gave him enough time to write! He always ended up writing something embarrassing. 

**L3VI:** No!

 **L3VI:** No, definitely not. I just need some down time.

 **L3VI:** Mammon has been pestering me, trying to find you for half the day.

 **MC:** Oh. Sorry!

 **L3VI:** How did you manage to avoid him? He only has one brain cell, but he’s practically a bloodhound when it comes to finding you.

That had been good. Re-direction!

 **MC:** Levia-chan, don’t be so mean to Mammon, even if he can’t hear it. You’ll hurt his feelings.

 **L3VI:** Loading ‘Attempting to Give a Fuck.gif’

 **MC:** *Unimpressed Demoji*

He hadn’t cared that she was unimpressed then, but now it caused an ache behind his sternum.

 **MC:** Talk later?

 **MC:** I could use your ear.

 **L3VI:** I’m marathoning ‘Problem Children Are Coming From Another World, Aren't They?’ tonight, just let yourself in.

The ache spread as he continued to re-read and he recognized it as embarrassment. Had she known how forward that was for him?

 **MC:** No password?

 **L3VI:** I said just let yourself in. Don’t make it weird.

 **MC:** *Kiss Blowing Demoji*

 **L3VI:** What did I just say!?

 **MC:** I think you said send me lots of pictures of your skimpy clubbing outfit.

 **L3VI:** I’m going to have to deep clean my D.D.D. STAAAWP.

Despite saying that, he’d continued to stare at the screen, waiting for her next reply.

 **MC:** You have an entire library of eroge games. Anything I send would be nun-like in comparison.

 **L3VI:** *Shocked Demoji*

Had she been messing with him? He remembered he’d had to put his D.D.D. face down to collect himself. Between images of half-remembered games, and what he’d seen of her in the hallway, he’d needed to think before he answered so he wouldn’t just mash the keys.

 **MC:** Levi, you have a nun sub-genre don’t you? That’s why you’re not answering.

 **L3VI:** JUST EAT YOUR FOOD, NORMIE!

 **MC:** That’s Henry 2.0 to you!

 **L3VI:** Henry would NEVER say these things!!!

He’d tossed his D.D.D. into his tub before attempting to drown himself in what he’d hoped would be mindless gaming. Within an hour, he’d given up and paced his room instead. 

So many thoughts had been tumbling through his head then. Was the kiss awful? Of course it was awful. It was with him. Also, sorry for that other time I passed out under you, and for letting Lucifer and Satan see your cuteness while I ran away. He’d never considered then that she’d be in danger when she left the house, and certainly not again after she’d returned home.

That line of thinking had gone nowhere, and he’d turned on an anime he’d been saving for another day. The storyline should’ve hooked him: perfect plot, voice actors on point, beautiful 2D girls, but the sensation of how he’d used his tongue to lick tattoos onto her the previous night had continually interrupted. The memory of his lips against the skin of her thigh had felt like a physical pressure. Even after so much time, he’d caught himself pressing his fingertips to his mouth.

The tingling memory had distracted him completely, then and again now. Laughing bitterly to himself, he remembered how he’d watched a character that had been on the screen since the first episode and been unable to remember their name. 

He’d rubbed his hands over his eyes and the dancing spots on the backs of his eyelids had become a flood of light. He’d turned, headphones still in place. He knew his expression had clearly said, _“Who the fuck is opening my door?”_ What normie would dare intrude? Ready to tell them exactly what he thought of their invasion of his privacy, he’d stopped. One look at Mammon had silenced him. 

Mammon’s posture had screamed restraint. “Leviathan, Third Lord of The Devildom, Grand Admiral of Hell’s Navy, report for duty.”

There had been no questions after that, no time for what if’s, only alertness and scrambling online to trawl for information. Asmodeus and Satan would do public relations and damage control later.

The only thing that had broken his concentration was the short message from Beelzebub in the main chat hours later. After that, there’d been no need to worry about the noise and the way the building shuddered. He’d had to focus and pushed everything else away. 

And then his phone had rung. Beelzebub’s name on his screen had confused him. Everyone but Lucifer abided by his preference for text, but then he’d heard her cries for help. The rest of the night had been a blur of water and trans-dimensional probability. Even the peck on the cheek she’d given him seemed surreal.

A heavy and hot sickness settled over him as he remembered sitting with his brothers to read one another’s reports. She hadn’t even tried to run when he’d been choking her and stabbing his nails into her neck, but she’d run from Beelzebub. He’d wanted to hug his younger brother downstairs, after her rejection but, his aversion to touch, tight and painful under his skin, had kept him in his chair. One day he would be brave enough not to care what they thought. She’d once said she knew he was brave enough, that he just needed practice. 

Leviathan’s hands twitched, and he picked up her discarded shoes to distract himself.

Making his way robotically to the bathroom, he nudged aside the bloody comforter and rinsed off her shoes in the sink. The look of betrayal on Beelzebub’s face floated to the front of his mind as he pulled off the chunk of eyeball still attached to the heel.

He’d covered her retreat, but it had been a near thing.

Quickly drying off the shoes with a hand towel, Leviathan made his way to her room and put the shoes into the only empty space on the shelf.

The reports had become a disturbing swirl of information for him, half forgotten as he worked mindlessly to clean and tidy. As he fished a cork out from under her bed, he felt his gorge rise at the sight of bits of scales, similar to his own but smaller, duller. They still littered the rugs and had wedged themselves between the floorboards. Self loathing followed close on the heels of his nausea. Useless. If he weren’t a shut-in he could have been at the Fall, or at least would have been with her after. Instead, he’d spend his time searching through the underbelly of the devilnet: the only thing he was good for. 

The cleaning was mostly complete, but there was still a queasy worry in his stomach that he hadn’t felt before. There was no edge of excitement to it, like before a concert or manga release date. He knew Lucifer would keep her safe, but there was no one there to protect her from Lucifer’s severity. She had looked so tired and small as she’d tottered away. If only she could breathe underwater.

Hands now full of the dirty comforter from the bathroom, Leviathan made his way out into the hall, giving additional tasks to Little Demons as he left. 

At least he knew Henry wouldn’t complain about sharing his tank tonight. He needed a dreamless slumber.


	83. 6 + 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day 47, Thursday, February 16th, the early hours.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Massive thank you to Dalektable for her hard work in editing this for me! <3

Belphegor whipped the ball at the wall again, waiting for it to return to his hand.

_‘Thunk!’_

_‘Tic.’_

_‘Pap._

It sounded hollowly against the wall and floor. 

_‘Thunk!’_

_‘Tic.’_

_‘Pap._

A hint of its sticky surface could be heard as it landed in his palm.

_‘Thunk!’_

_‘Tic.’_

_‘Pap._

“Could you stop that?” Beel asked, pacing, his snack pile untouched on his bed.

“Can you stop walking back and forth like a caged animal?” Belphegor asked from halfway under his comforter.

The dirty look that met Belphegor’s own only encouraged him to throw it harder.

_‘Thunk!’_

_‘Tic.’_

Beel caught the ball between its floor bounce and Belphegor’s waiting hand.

With a sigh, Belphegor extinguished his lamp and rolled over, making a show of going to sleep. 

It wasn’t that one night apart was chafing at him, or even that she was spending another night in Lucifer’s room; it was a painful desire that encompassed all of it. Harshly, he stuffed down the need to sequester her with himself and Beel. 

He told himself that keeping her close would only be until he was sure she was safe, but each time he crushed the idea; his selfish need to have her near was on par with Beel’s, and he needed to be the responsible one right now. Their time in the shower together would have to be enough for tonight.

Near dropping off to sleep, the mattress sagged next to Belphegor as Beel sat, and a pit of pain broke open inside his ribcage. Sharing her also meant sharing her betrayals. 

The pact was the only reason Beelzebub had left her side during the attack. Her orders had remained rigidly strong while Leviathan held her life in his hands; they'd been forced to remain at bay while he squeezed the life out of her. It would have been futile for Beelzebub to fight it when she still had her wits about her. Was it worth keeping the pact then? It wasn’t like she could summon them on her own. All she could do was order them to line up like school children.

Images of her dangling by the neck from Leviathan’s hand wouldn’t stop playing through his mind. It was too much like how he’d killed her, only this time he’d been helplessly, completely unable to push against the pact. Satan’s placations had done little to soothe him then or now. 

"What do you want to do?" Belphegor asked.

"Kick in the door, tear down the wards," Beel said, covering his face with his hands, "bring her back here to explain, and then make her sleep."

"Hmmm. She might already be asleep," Belphegor said, trying to keep his responses non-committal.

Beel lay himself down on the bed, close enough that Belphegor could feel his breath against the back of his neck. The churning in his gut hadn't subsided, so he decided to play along. "Lucifer won't take the intrusion lightly."

Stubborn silence met his words.

"I doubt Lucifer has forgotten your previous defiance, Beel,” he said, “when you took her away from him, after the mess with Levi, just to carry her to her bathroom..." He paused over each small point to let it sink in.

"It doesn't matter. She should be here with us. She's ours."

Belphegor sighed, and rolled over to face him, concentrating on spreading out his senses for something far away rather than what was in front of him. "She's asleep."

Even with the lamp off, it was still possible to make out Beel's frown, his eyes glowing faintly, lighting the space between them.

"Beel, we can talk to her in the morning when everyone has calmed down," he said, trying to keep the frustration from his voice. It didn’t help that he couldn’t think of anything else either. “Now close your eyes. Your eyes shouldn’t be glowing like you’re a child who can’t control the flow of his magic.”

“It’s not good to go to bed angry.”

Beel’s words were finally lacking some of the hardness Belphegor detested. He could still feel the anger through their bond, but it was easier to deal with than the blank, quiet certainty of his orders. It was best not to tell him how deep she was sleeping. As it was, he was having enough trouble keeping them both as composed they were. He had only his apathy to counter the intensity of Beel’s frustration. 

“All right, let’s get serious then,” Belphegor said. “Let’s plan.” Beel would kick in the door for sure if he wasn’t distracted soon, and engineering a plan was win-win for the both of them.

“She stopped you and Satan from saving her when Leviathan lost control,” Beel said, before Belphegor could continue. “She put herself between me and Lucifer. I’m sure she’ll do it again if we don’t find a way to stop her.”

Belphegor didn’t look down between their bodies, but he could hear his brother’s knuckles cracking from the tightness of his clenching fists. “Would her word not to do it again be enough?”

There was a pause before Beel answered, trepidation clear in his tone. “I’m not sure she’d forgive us if we bespelled her, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“We could change the pacts,” Belphegor said, his voice quiet in their large room, “or add different layers and stipulations to them.” It would be difficult to change them, likely painful, but still possible.

“Do you think she would?” The orange light in Beel’s eyes dimmed, leaving only the rims of his eyes aglow.

Belphegor could feel the hesitation in his twin, the fear of rejection once again acidic in the back of his own throat. “She already said she was ours,” he said, trying to convince himself. Her previous dismissals rose to the surface of his thoughts. “What reason would she have to refuse?”

“It doesn’t feel any different,” Beel said. With the admission he pressed his forehead against Belphegor’s. “Isn’t it supposed to feel different?” He was contaminating the room with his confusion, and the new feeling of discord took hold, growing stronger in them both. “Is she actually ours?”

Belphegor sighed. “If I go poke around her psyche will you stay put?”

“You have fifteen minutes before I go kick in the door.”

* * *

Another sigh and the rapid slackening of Belphie’s limbs told Beelzebub that he was walking somewhere he couldn’t follow. He waited impatiently, trying his best not to leave or shake his twin awake. 

He hated this. He hated being alone as soon as he exposed his worries aloud, even if it meant he’d feel better later, but Belphie was always like this: act first and think second. Now Beelzebub had to trust that he hadn’t been abandoned in favour of sleep, or been forgotten if Belphie dreamwalked into something interesting.

Listening to Belphie’s breathing increase was not comforting. Where had he gone that took so much effort? Beelzebub slid his hand into Belphie’s, watching the tension of his limbs, and feeling the surliness grow through their bond with each passing second.

It startled him when Belphie gasped and his eyes snapped open. “What did you see? Is she alright?”

Belphie wrenched his hand away from its refuge within Beelzebub’s grasp. “It didn’t take. Neither of them. I searched and prodded, but there’s nothing there except the old pact bonds.”

“Why does it feel like you aren’t telling me everything?” Beelzebub asked, trying to make sense of the emotions that were passing too quickly over Belphie’s face, the echo of it cascading into him.

“It’s not important,” Belphie said. He bit out the words before very obviously trying to feign indifference. “It’s probably only a matter of proximity.”

The corners of Beelzebub’s mouth didn’t dip into his usual frown; they fell deeper, almost matching the severity of the lines between his eyebrows. He could tell it put Belphie more on edge than if he’d yelled his frustration and disappointment out. It should. 

“Quit thinking like that,” Belphie said, sitting up.

“ _What’s_ not important?” Beelzebub asked, his words mostly a growl.

“She doesn’t have a pact with him, but...there is a weak bond with Lucifer’s magic,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “I’m not even sure how she’s able to manage it without a pact to protect her from the worst of the recoil.” 

Belphie settled back down to stare at the ceiling, and Beelzebub could see his hands twitching, likely trying to work his way by memory through the sensation of each bond he’d tested around her.

“You talk like Leviathan didn’t just dangle her by her neck despite a pact.”

“There are a hundred ways to subvert a pact’s protection if you can convince yourself it’s in the best interest of the pact holder.” Belphie muttered absentmindedly with a dismissive wave. 

Belphie’s body tensed and Beelzebub tried to watch closely for any other hint of his actual thoughts. “It’s true…” Beelzebub said, “pacts are usually negotiated more carefully to avoid those loopholes, but our protection was implicit when we bound ourselves.”

“What do you want me to say, Beel?” Belphie asked, his arms lifting up and away from him in a show of exasperation. “Pacts should protect themselves too, by feeding off both sources of magic, but she doesn’t have any magic! Nothing about this is normal.” 

Belphie’s outburst created an uncomfortable silence.

“I don’t like it,” Beelzebub ended the silence quickly, his voice deeper than usual, slipping into Infernal speech. “What do you mean they didn’t take?” He thought back on the way she’d felt against him in the shower, and tried to smother the accompanying need for her with thoughts of food instead. “She agreed, didn’t she?” 

“Did she though?” Belphie asked, strumming his fingers on his chest in thought. “The _exact_ words shouldn’t need to be said if the intent behind them matches…” 

‘“ _Between two evils is not worth choosing_ ,”’ Beelzebub said. At the time her words had reminded him of her stubborn, idiotic protection while in the tomb with Lucifer and Luke. His stomach growled angrily, and he rolled over, diving head first into the nest of pillows and groaned. “She didn’t say it. She said she didn’t ever want to come between us. There was no promise in it!”

Eyes widening in surprise, Belphie quickly covered them with his hands. “I’m an idiot.” He turned back to look at Beelzebub lying prone next to him. “We’ve been tricked,” he said, his voice filled with annoyance, but he sighed afterwards, his smile hinting at something more when Beelzebub peeked at him. “We never speak of this to Mammon. He can never know she duped us as well.”

“It’s different being tricked out of a secondary bond than into the first one,” Beelzebub said, his voice muffled once again by the mattress below, the new layers of pillows above him now held tightly against the back of his head.

“Tricking a demon is tricking a demon,” Belphie said. “All the more reason she’s perfect for us. Why she needs to be with us.”

“I still say we should go and get her right now.” The sensation of her around him earlier had been enough to drown out Belphie’s jealousy _and_ his own hunger. It was haunting him. Every one of her kisses had had him twitching inside her. That she wasn’t here with them was possibly more painful as his hunger pangs. “Let’s go. Right now,” he said, sitting up and knocking away the pillows.

Belphie’s body tensed and Beelzebub tried to watch closely for any other hint of his actual thoughts. “Beel, how about we feed you while we think of a longer term plan,” Belphie asked, sitting up lazily, waiting to be carried to the kitchen. “A thinking Beel is formidable. A hungry Beel is dangerous. Both together could be fatal. Let’s go.”

“That’s not an answer,” Beelzebub said, but he still got up from the bed. “Maybe she just doesn’t want to be ours.”

Belphie looked as though he was trying to consider the idea, but dismissed it quickly, after a polite pause. “Whenever I asked she said _‘can’t.’_ Not won’t, or don’t want. _‘Can’t’_.”

Beelzebub _‘hmm’_ d’ and picked up Belphie, carrying him under his arm as he made his way out the door and down the hall. “You didn’t say anything had changed with any of her pacts, so it can’t be anything like that in the way. No new pacts from outside that we need to address.”

“She hid me from Mammon until he barged in, it could just be a matter of her worry over jealousy, or hurt feelings,” Belphie said, hanging limp over his twin’s arm.

“Let’s just skip claiming and ask her to be our consort.”

There was silence as he walked, and he shrugged his shoulders, Belphie rising and falling with it, as they entered the kitchen.

“You know, Beel, that actually might not be a bad idea.”

Dropping Belphie on a stool, Beelzebub found a haunch of shadow hog within the fridge and began to make short work of it.

“We could add a clause that doesn’t allow for self-sacrifice, or defiance of orders while under attack,” Belphie said, leaning heavily on the prep table. “If we pitch it correctly she might not hate it.”

Beelzebub nodded while he chewed, not taking the time to fully swallow before he spoke. “She doesn’t seem like she’d want a title, but it might show how serious we are and outweigh whatever’s in the way.”

“Alright, tomorrow we gauge likelihood of success,” Belphie said, his eyes beaming out from the gaps in his messy hair. His optimism was blinding. 

Beelzebub nodded again, devouring someone else’s clearly labelled leftovers. They didn’t have a firm answer to the question of whether she wanted them both together, or just as shower and nap companions, and that fact constantly buzzed around him. He tried to hide his worry behind a wall of food. If she didn’t want them together, would he still have to compete with Belphie? Would she give him the greatest portion of her affections? 

“You talk with her about demonic resilience,” Belphegor said while pulling out his D.D.D., “and how human self-sacrifice is bad, and I will find out what makes her think this is not the best idea any of us has ever come up with.” 

The faint chime from the device told Beelzebub that the scheduling app was loading. 

“Tomorrow is going to be a productive day so long as we can pry her away from Lucifer,” Belphie said. Then, as an afterthought, “and Mammon.”

Now eating directly out of the fridge rather than turning around, Beelzebub’s heart clenched at the sound of enthusiasm in his twin’s voice, something that had been missing for far too long. “If they don’t know already from Mammon, the others are going to be upset when they find out we’ve claimed her as ours.” He was trying not to let his pessimism drag Belphie back down, but it was clear he wasn’t looking at the bigger picture. “Most of them are as bad at sharing as we are.” 

“I’m not concerned. As long as they don’t work together we should be fine,” Belphie said.

“There’s no way to undo our need for her now...but I know the others probably like her almost as much as we do, at least in their own ways. I’m not sure they’ll be as easily distracted or manipulated as you think.”

“Divide and conquer, Beel. You and I are more than enough to destabilize them before it comes even close to outright hostilities. We’ll need to think of something in case they go crying to Lucifer or Diavolo though.” Pitching his voice loudly over the new crunching sounds, Belphie sounded confident.

Beelzebub remained quiet, letting his words continue to sink in and build new ideas and concerns in Belphegor’s mind.

“Asmo and Satan are easy. She just needs to give a small chunk of undivided attention to Asmo and he’ll flutter off, distracted by something else. Satan is probably happy with a hand hold and book reading, but you know how he wanders off. He’ll forget about her until he finds a new book to share and then it’ll repeat.”

“Hmm,” Beelzebub said. “You didn’t see the state Asmo was in when he had to ask about the toy and her capture. There’s more there than you’re willing to see.”

Belphie scoffed. “Leviathan could be tricky. This is his first ‘best friend,’ but even he needs to dedicate most of his day to his hobbies. We can easily throw him off by appealing to his need to keep her healthy. She can’t survive in his lair for long.”

“And Mammon?” 

“That’s…” Belphie tapped at his screen, clearly buying more time to better influence and calm Beelzebub. 

Beelzebub didn’t interfere, he wanted to be convinced. 

“Mammon isn’t a ball in our court. He’s in a different game,” Belphie said, “and the only ones who can move him from point guard to defense are his mistress and Lucifer. If we have one of them in partial agreement with us we can reduce his efficiency, _but_ if we have even one of those coaches fully on board with us then it will be enough to bench him.”

When it was clear Belphie was once again engrossed in his D.D.D, Beelzebub moved to get something to drink while thoughts continued to circle relentlessly. 

She’d said she wouldn’t choose, but she also didn’t accept them both when she had the chance to tonight. If the threat of obliteration wasn’t enough to make her choose between saving him and Luke in the tomb, it might be impossible to make her choose between him and Belphegor’s love if she didn’t want to. What if she chose neither of them again? 

The need to have her touch him as softly as she’d commanded him earlier was overwhelming. He looked back at the ransacked fridge and cupboards. Every muscle in his body felt tense, aching with a craving for something that not even food took the edge off of any longer. ‘We should go get her,’ he thought again, eager to have her reassure them. 

_"I want to be the first thing you touch in the morning, and the last thing you taste at night,"_ is what she’d said. The words had soaked into his heart. She wouldn’t say it back to him like that unless she meant it. He’d find a way to be with her, with them, if possible.

He could feel Belphie’s eyes on him again and set to filling the glass he’d been holding for too long under the waterless faucet.

* * *

_“Get your shiny soul into bed already,” Lucifer said, turning to face her. Not that he gave her a chance to, with her hands still caught in his._

_She sighed loudly and slid away from him._

Like the rocking of the sea, a gentle lull was dragging at her consciousness, pulling her away from the depths of sleep. The longer she concentrated on it, the stranger it was and the more vulnerable she felt. 

Her shoulders wiggled as she tried to shake the feeling away, and for a short time the small movement seemed to have worked. There was a warm safety that held her tightly, but as much as she scrunched up, and tried to kick herself deeper into the depths of sleep, her mind continued to surface.

She should probably dislike the feeling of Lucifer's arms wrapped around her, should probably kick up a fuss, but right now he was making her feel safe, and she settled for a barely intelligible, “Good morning.” 

Yawning, she retracted her arms stiffly to touch less of him and took stock of her surroundings. They were in one of the hallways of the House of Lamentation. The swaying motion that she had woken to was clearly from Lucifer carrying her from his room at this god forsaken hour.

The deep rumble she received in return was without an English counterpart, and she snuggled back into his shoulder, closing her eyes without complaint. She wondered what time it was, trying to shake away his well meaning command to sleep.

Focusing more clearly after they’d passed a few more doors, she recognized that they were not far off from her own room. Sooner than she expected, she was seated on her large and empty bed. 

It was a relief to move away from him, even if that meant leaving behind the warmth around her. Lucifer was too difficult to predict, and she was far too sleepy to gamble right now. She looked around, confused by the cleanliness of her room and the relative messiness of the blankets on her bed.

“Gather some clothing for the day. I’ll be leaving you in Leviathan’s care while I’m away.”

It wasn’t worth it to argue or ask anything. She was too tired. Once her body knew it was safe to sleep, there was no keeping her from it.

From a basket of clean, folded laundry next to her, she pulled out a thick hooded sweater and loose jogging pants. Tugging on the bottoms over the romper she wore was easy enough, but she glared at the sweater in her lap as if it were a mortal enemy. Some of that unamused expression stayed with her when she dropped her head to the side and looked up at Lucifer.

He likely wasn’t impressed by the huff she let out or at the way she silently brandished the sweater at him, but he still helped her pull it on, careful, at first, to avoid catching the scabs along her back.

“You’re going to meet Diavolo?” she asked from halfway inside the sweater.

He stopped, letting her flounder in the outerwear.

“You mentioned it on the phone last night. Please stop staring at me and help me,” she said. She remembered the many times before she’d forgotten deference to the princely title and winced in advance. Lucifer tugged the sweater all the way down at once.

“ _Lord_ Diavolo,” he said, as her head popped through the neck hole.

“Yeah, that one,” she said, trying not to flinch too obviously. His lack of exasperated sigh over her failure with honorifics was missing.

“What time is it?” she asked when he didn’t humour her.

“Early,” he said, and scooped her back up.

She grumbled out a noise of discontent as a fizzle of excitement and fear flipped in her belly, but just as quickly as those emotions washed over her, she found herself falling back asleep. Having two warm layers around her only made the idea of sleep all the more seductive. 

It had only been a single blink, but they were already in Leviathan’s room. The soft light and whir of pumps and fans announced it before she opened her eyes. 

She made a sound of discontent as she tried to remember why they were there and why she wasn’t snuggled up in bed with Mammon. He’d obviously been in her bed; no one else didn't pull up the covers afterward.

Lucifer set her down on her unsteady feet and watched her toddle the few steps to Leviathan’s makeshift bed. He looked away from Leviathan’s pleading eyes when she looked back at him and clamoured gracelessly into the occupied bathtub.

“What am I supposed to do with her?” Leviathan hissed, as she settled her knees between his legs. “Lucifer!”

She didn’t hear much of their conversation, too focused on patting Leviathan’s head to shush him into compliance, before she flopped down to sleep against his chest. Leviathan would forgive her for this eventually, so she let the sluggishness overtake her again.

“Thirteen of them?” Leviathan asked, looking down at the unconscious human on him.


	84. A Little Help from my Friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day 47, Thursday morning, February 16th

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, major props to Dalektable for sifting through comma-hell to make this story readable.

She stretched painfully, trying, without success, to straighten from the strange position she found herself in. She felt her lips slide across something warm and soft when she yawned, and she crossed her eyes, trying to decipher the dark pattern that filled her vision.

“Levi?” she asked, mumbling into his neck as she focused on the faint outlines of purple and black diamonds staring back at her. When there was no answer, she laughed quietly, sending little puffs of air against his bare skin. “You need a proper bed if you don’t want my cuddles,” she said, squeaking the last word out when he leaned away from her mouth and his tail constricted around her leg and pulled down.

“Remind me why I’m on top of you?” she asked as she pushed herself up onto her knees and ignored his mumbling. She shook her right leg and his tail dissipated into nothing, allowing her to sit back on her heels. Blinking groggily, she wiggled her toes. When did she put on socks?

“Levi?” she asked again. Leviathan had not relaxed in the slightest after she’d moved away. She rubbed at her eyes and flinched when the skin of her back stretched with the motion.

“Lucifer,” Leviathan began, sounding confident, as if he’d practiced it. 

Nothing else came out of him and she noticed how his hands gripped the lip of the tub with white knuckles. 

“Ah, sorry. I’ll just—” she said. As she reached for the support of the tub, the scabs on her back cracked, and she sucked in a deep breath before bringing her hands slowly back down to her sides. “You may have to...” She cleared her throat and looked at her knees, hugging her elbows close. “You may have to help me up if you want me elsewhere.” 

“Uwah—Don’t cry!” Leviathan said, sitting up and trying to whisper his shouts when he saw her face scrunch up.

“I’m not going to cry! I’m mad,” she said, exhaling forcefully. “I don’t like needing help.”

He watched her for a moment before his hand crept forward and pinched one of her sleeves, lifting it in an attempt to stare down into the gap between her cuff and wrist. 

“Are you still hurt?” he asked.

“A little.”

His frown wasn’t reassuring. 

Waking up was always either a paradise or a chore here. “So...” she said, letting the last few days of violence and emotion whirl through her mind. 

“Lucifer said I’m supposed to watch you today,” Leviathan said, setting her arm back down in her lap.

“Not Mammon?” she asked. 

“He’s with Lucifer and the twins.” An unexpected hint of bass coloured his voice, and he looked at Henry’s tank instead of her.

“Quit that,” she said. She wanted to swat his leg but couldn’t convince her elbows to leave her sides just yet. Even voicing her frustration felt like a struggle, as if someone had hit hibernate on her system functions. Shutting down earlier now left her struggling to start up, much less execute complex programs. “I was only asking where my usual babysitter is. So, if you keep up your pouting I’m gonna pinch your cheeks.” It was a terrible bluff. Her brain was still buffering and she doubted she could reach his face before he moved.

* * *

Leviathan’s usual denials died on his lips as he took the time to actually look at her. She was teasing him the same as normal, obviously tired, but she looked smaller and was covered head to toe in thick clothing. She’d only covered up like this once before, and she’d locked them all out of her room then, refusing to come out for two whole days. “Are you…” he looked her up and down again. “Are you okay?”

She didn’t shrug, but the way her body rose and fell as she exhaled gave the same impression. “Nothing that won’t heal.”

“I meant like—" He cleared his throat. "Um, the feels.”

“My feels?” she asked, stalling as she fidgeted with her hands. “My feels are like a browser with too many tabs open right now.” Her laughter came out as a muted exhalation of air. “At least three of my tabs are frozen, and I can’t figure out where the music is playing.” Her weak lopsided smile wasn’t enough to fool even him.

He watched her head tilt to the side and tried to parse through her body language. What would it mean if Darona the Brave had looked away like that when her party leader confronted her about her health? 

“I dunno...I'm somewhere between giving up, and seeing how much more insanity I can withstand,” she said, watching as Leviathan’s tail shimmered back into existence next to her. “It’s getting to the point where I’m not even sure what day it is.”

He nodded sympathetically, before the memory of her running through the halls shook him from the touch filled stupor she’d created. Drawing himself up with righteous anger, he jabbed a finger at her. “No, wait! I’m supposed to be mad at you! You ran away from me and Beel!”

“ _ You skipped me across the pool like a rock _ ,” she said with absolutely no inflection. She didn’t even glance at his accusing finger, her eyes looking distant and dead. “ _ I think we can call it even for today. _ ”

He swallowed his next words and was unable to meet her gaze. She seemed so far away, and he’d seen that look enough times in others to know his words wouldn’t reach her. 

How could he have forgotten? It was what they were supposed to talk about last night: seeing her kissing Beelzebub in the gym, Valentine’s day, almost drowning her. They were supposed to talk about it all.

“What’d I miss while I was asleep?” she asked, coming back to herself a bit, her eyes softening when they met his again. 

His lips moved as he tried to speak, but nothing came out. Did she mean what he’d been looking for on the Devilnet? Beneath the casual user’s use of the Devilnet? What she’d missed after she left The Fall last night? Would she find that tradition repulsive? Did she mean after Lucifer put her to bed? How much of the night did she remember? 

“Well, Asmo is on breakfast duty, if today is still Friday,” she said, giving him more time to flounder in his thoughts. “How many people should I expect to be missing when we sit down?”

“It’s just Asmo, Satan and us,” he said, tapping his pointer fingers together in front of his chest, focusing solely on them.

“Hmm,” she said, her eyebrows rising the tiniest degree. “Keeping trouble makers together, and Beel along to reign them in?”

“Something like that,” he said, trying to keep the bitterness out of his voice. After drooling on his shoulder, why were the first words out of her mouth about them?

She didn’t seem convinced, but was quickly distracted by his tail as it twitched. Picking it up in one hand, she snagged his bare hand in the other. “I didn’t know you could mix and match your forms! Where are your horns?”

Her exclamation after such lethargy startled him, and her grabbing jolted him into action, his limbs flailing. It was a struggle not to transform completely in alarm.

“Oh, come on Levi...” she said as she leaned away from his airborne leg. “You licked tattoos onto my body the night before last! Me touching your hand isn’t nearly as bad.”

“Don’t remind me!”

“Oh…” she said, instantly dropping both squirming appendages. “I didn’t realize you were ashamed of that.”

“No, no, no, no, no! I'm sorry!” he said, watching her deflate. The way she said ‘oh’ somehow stabbed beneath his sternum and in a single blow, dissolved the power that had begun to seep out of him. He grabbed her hands back up in one of his and the other in a coil of his tail. “It’s fine. It’s not like—I mean—I just—surprised?” 

She nodded slowly, and gave a small smile back, but he could see her playfulness had evaporated. Usually, she bounced back from his panicked blunders, used it to tease him more, but not today. Only an otaku like him could turn holding a girl’s hand into making her sad. He grimaced at the way she held his tail but still looked like she’s going to cry. How had she not noticed his lack of horns before? 

“Quit looking at me like I’m going to break,” she said, muttering down at her hands. “Henrys don’t just crumble.”

“W-where are you hurt?” he asked, instead of reminding her of how she’d recently sobbed in his arms until she’d passed out. He was supposed to be convincing her to forgive him for the Valentine’s Day fiasco, not making her cry again.

She sighed, still looking tired despite having just woken. “I don’t even know anymore. Most of it is on my back, but Lucifer didn’t tell me what it looks like.” 

Indignation rolled off of Leviathan in dark waves, like a mirage of smoke.

“Levi?” she asked, trying to pull away from him. She moved to shrink into the other end of the tub, despite her hands still captured by him.

“Ah! No! I’m not mad at  _ you _ !” he said quickly. He wrapped his tail further up her forearm as he worked to reign in his magic again. “Lucifer can be—it’s just, he should have told you  _ and _ me.”

Her fear melted away into giggles, until she was nearly hysterical with them. She tugged her hand out of his and tilted her head to wipe away a tear with her sleeve. “Ha! We might get you into the Formerly Anti-Lucifer League yet.”

He couldn’t keep up with this human. Her emotions were going to kill him. ‘PICK ONE!’ he wanted to shout. No, he needed to be more patient. She’d almost died three times in the last few days. This was just like with Barracuda Jack, he reminded himself. They needed to be patient and careful after the first of the Sponge Wars. They needed to rebuild the confidence of each of the characters before the second story arc could begin. 

If only the uncomfortable prickle of heat over his skin would go away, then he could concentrate on getting his heart rate down. He took a deep breath. As long as he could think of her as 2D right now, everything would be fine. 

His tail squeezed her wrist in time with the tensing of his body before he attempted to stop hunching over on himself. “Show me where you’re hurt,” he said, squaring up with her and throwing back his shoulders. He would channel Admiral Tonso of  _ Midnight Brigade _ ; Injuries weren’t his specialty, but the Admiral was resourceful and confident, and if Mammon could bandage her, how hard could it be?

“I can’t get out of this on my own,” she said, her giggles dying down to hiccoughs. “So, your options are to help me out of it or cut me out of it if you want to check.”

“C-cut you out of it?” he asked, his voice an octave too high. He could do this. He could do this. He was a competent demon. This wasn’t giving a speech or taking public transit. It was just...just making adjustments for a cosplay; a few snips were the first step. He just needed to focus on one step at a time.

“I can’t lift my arms up high enough to get out on my own,” she said. “It took Lucifer a while to get me into it, and even then the last half was not the most gentle...”

The heat of his face told him how red he must be, but he’d had hours to prepare for anything she could throw at him. Nodding, he willed himself forward. He didn’t trust his willpower to last long enough to put his arms around her and undress her, but with a hand over his eyes, and the other extended with a claw to her, he snagged the fabric she positioned between them. He heard it tear.

“A little more help?” she asked.

Peeking through the slots of his fingers, he used his tail to move up the back of her torn sweater, holding it away from her as she shrugged out of the thick covering. 

It was obvious right away that the bruise he’d inflicted was missing from around her neck, and he struggled between relief and envy. The ceiling was suddenly the most interesting it had ever been, and he glared up at it.  _ A team above all. Above all a team, _ he reminded himself. This was the newest mantra he wielded against his jealousy. 

“You’re going to have to look down at some point, Levia-chan. You’re supposed to tell me what my damage is.”

The light, teasing quality was back in her voice, and he considered finding a game that would occupy them both, instead of having to struggle through this. Was she amused at his expense? Maybe she was just pitying him and guiding him through the steps, or was she just happy to wake up with him? His heart was going to doki-doki-explode if she came closer again. “Fine, but I get a-a high five,” he said, “to claim whenever I want!” 

“Alright,” she said and he could see from the corner of his eye that she was trying not to laugh.

When he finally faced her again, he looked more carefully and noticed hickies where evidence of his hand around her throat should have been. He didn’t hide his frown, but was quickly distracted from the marks by the sight of her pajamas. Low cut pajamas. Practically lingerie pajamas. ‘Holy Bernoulli, she’s not wearing a bra!’

“Levi? Levi!” She called to him as he fell back against the incline of the tub with a thunk.

“No bra...” he croaked, barely managing to get the words out as his spirit tried to leave his body.

“You can’t be serious right now,” she said, shuffling herself closer, her bony fingers poised to jab between his ribs. “ Come on, Leviathan. It’s not like you touched them. Half the population has them anyway! More if you consider some men and spirits!” 

Why did she have to mention touching them? How was he supposed to unthink  _ that _ now?

“Leviathan, is this a pull the band-aid off quickly or a put more dressing over the wound kind of problem?”

“Why would you put more dressing over a bandage? It's already got a plasticized covering.” he asked woozily, before he felt his hand pressed over something soft and warm. 

“Levi, I know you’re not completely unconscious, you faker. I’m just going to leave your hand here until you can be fully awake without comparing this to a drama.”

It felt like falling. He was falling. And just before he hit the ground, his body jerked awake. He tried to wriggle away and hide in his embarrassment. There had to be a darker corner of his lair he could crawl into where she couldn’t see him. He spasmed again and felt the dread and anticipation as the movement travelled down his limbs and into his fingertips. 

His eyes rolled back, and his body went slack against the tub as the warmth of her breast under his palm overwhelmed him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello my lovely readers!
> 
> If you haven't had a chance, please give my survey a quick glance. It shouldn't take more than two minutes (thirty seconds if you don't answer question four). Don't worry, there are only five questions. https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DD38R8B
> 
> If you have had a chance, I have added a fifth question, which you should be able to access still. If not, the survey is set up to let you take it more than once (since you might have a different opinion since I posted it in May 2020).


	85. Skinship

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 47th Day, Thursday
> 
> MC has been left in Leviathan's care while Lucifer is away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big shout out to Dalektable for editing this chapter for me!

**47th Day, Thursday**

Every time Leviathan started to wake, he would slightly squeeze the breast pressed into his palm and knock himself back out; it was twenty minutes before he finally came to and stopped hyperventilating. She had long since stolen his D.D.D. from his pocket to read, still holding his hand to her covered breast with the inside of her bicep. 

“Why are you doing this?” he asked, panting as if she were torturing him and not calmly scrolling through his library.

“It’s the next step in your desentization training,” she said calmly as she scrolled to the next panel of digital manga.

“But whyyyy?” His tail lashed wildly around them but didn’t hit her.

“Because you want to check on me, but you can’t.”

He growled at her matter-of-fact response. 

She knew it was supposed to be menacing, but she was listening intently and heard it for what it really was. As adverse as he was to it, he needed touch. Each deep squall he sounded off spoke of how desperately he wanted skinship. Any skinship. She doubted it even mattered if it was her, but it was her presence that was keeping it at the fore of his mind.

“Take off your shirt,” she said, and he lost control of his tail completely. 

It struck one of the floating jellyfish, sending it sailing onto his desk, where it crash landed between game manuals, narrowly missing the screens and the perfectly aligned figurines.

“WHAT?” 

“You can put your gloves on if you want,” she said, motioning to his casual attire. If he could mix and match with his demonic appendages, it shouldn’t be a problem to manifest his gloves and sweatpants at the same time.

“I shouldn’t—we shouldn’t—”

She tried her best not to roll her eyes at his high pitched concern. “We won’t,” she said with calm certainty.

“Of course we wouldn't. I mean why would you ever want someone like—never mind. I—not that I thought—”

“You’re very handsome, but I am perfectly capable of controlling myself,” she said, cutting off his rambling and releasing his hand from her chest. “Now, take off your shirt.”

She’d expected him to make a break for it, but he was still in the tub looking anywhere but at her. His face was red, and his eyes were so wide she was worried that he was going to burst something. 

“I’m not going to do anything perverted, so close your eyes already,” she said when his shirt and sweater had disappeared.

Leviathan gripped the edges of the tub and closed his eyes just as tightly.

A portion of last night bubbled to the fore of her mind and she remembered how much she’d wanted to cuddle with Leviathan and eat popcorn together, instead of issue orders in the cold hallway. There were far worse things to be doing in the morning than this.

She took a deep breath and reorganized her priorities: This wasn’t just about stealing comfort; today she would make time for their shock therapy. 

Letting her own trepidations fall away, she slid the thin straps of her black romper off until the fabric pooled at her waist. He’d need to be able to look lower than her outfit allowed, and it would be easier to rip off the bandaid all in one go than to have to sit up after the session and disrobe.

Even though she could feel the wounds splitting open to the air again, she wrapped her arms around his neck and leaned forward into him. The scabs on her back would crack no matter what. At least this was for a worthy cause.

Leviathan’s eyes shot open, and under the strain of his clenched hands the lip of the tub snapped off and crumbled.

“Easy there. You’re all right,” she said softly, making sure not to breathe on his neck. “It’s just skin, right?”

“Yeah, but your—your—and they’re—”

“Technically I’m showing less skin than when I’m in my bathing suit. Think of it as a percentage.”

She felt him untense only slightly. “Deep breaths, nice and slow. Right? Just like when I was overwhelmed. This is the same.”

“Not the same at all,” he said through gritted teeth. His breath was still shallow and rapid.

“Am I your Henry?”

“Yes, but—”

“No  _ buts _ . Am I, or am I not?”

“You are,” he said. The air in his lungs stuttered out of him with the quiet proclamation.

“Good. And Henry always helps the Lord of Shadows overcome everything in their way, right?”

“You know he does,” he shot back, irritably.

“Perfect. Then I will stay right here until you’re able to breathe normally and wrap your arms around me,” she said, not giving a hint of humour until the very last moment. “Your tail already has the right idea.”

It seemed impossible, but his posture became even more rigid when he noticed his tail had curled around her thigh. 

“Argh! I did it again without thinking. This is so embarrassing! Even fingerlings can control their appendages.” He cringed, trying to draw his limbs inward, only to stretch them back out as he found himself touching more of her. “Why me?”

“It’s tickling my foot again, so we’re both trying not to freak out, right?”

“Right,” he said breathlessly, before ignoring her completely in favour of looking towards his door.

Quietly, she began to hum. It was the song she’d listened to over and over again with Belphegor. It seemed right. It fit here under the caustic light that swayed and undulated white and blue patterns over the room.

“How do you know that?” Leviathan asked. His words were whispered so quietly that she never would have made them out if they weren’t inches apart.

“Hmm? It was in Belphegor’s music library,” she said, ignoring the way his tail tightened around her leg all the way down to her ankle. “He said it was yours and became a lullaby.”

When Leviathan didn’t complain, she continued humming. Without any encouragement, he began to sing along, surprising her. At first she was puzzled by what she heard. Could Leviathan sing two notes at once?

She liked the way he wound a harmony around the melody in a way she couldn’t, a sustained low drone with a high whistle simultaneously flowing out of him. The words were foreign, and the scale he sang a portion of it in was unknown to her, but it was beautiful and melancholic, like every lullaby.

“What does it mean?” she asked when he stopped.

“I forgot you’re too young to know that tongue,” he whispered.

She stayed silent and waited.

“You want to know?” he asked, the tremble of his voice giving away his disbelief. “Are you trying to trick me so you can laugh at me too?” He tilted his head to rest his temple against hers.

She felt his tail loosen its coil around her thigh, and the blood flow returned in pins and needles. “Of course I want to know. It’s beautiful, and about you.”

Eventually he cleared his throat. “It doesn’t translate very well into English.”

“Try?” she asked, her tone hushed and undemanding.

It was the vibration under her that she noticed first. Did he know he was growling? Was it part of the song? The harmony was absent, but the melody was still beautiful, and she listened to the deep rumble of his chest, like waves crashing close together on the shore. She tried her best to practice what she’d learned, to see in her mind what his words and Infernal noises would reveal together. 

“This is the black sea-brute bulling through wave-wrack, Ancient as ocean's shifting hills.”

Leviathan’s words sent a shiver through her, but it went unnoticed by him. 

“Who in sea-toils, Travelling, who furrowing the salt acres, From bellowing fields, past bone-wreck of vessels, Tide-ruin, wash of lost bodies bobbing.” 

She felt the tension returning to his body with each verse, and fought the urge to tense in kind. The sound wasn’t as gentle as she’d expected either.

“No longer sought for, and islands of ice gleaming, Who ravening the rank flood, wave-marshalling, Overmastering the dark sea-marches, finds home And harvest.”

The last note he held, letting it hang in the air, and she held her breath as she waited for the next line to crash down over her ears. But he grew quiet. His words lapped softly at her, as if to pull them both under to somewhere darker, where her thoughts were slower and muddier. 

“The hulk of him is like hills heaving, Dark, yet as crags of drift-ice, crowns cracking in thunder, surf churning and trailing,” he whispered, his voice breaking with emotion. “Along his shores' rushing about the dark of his jaws; and who should moor at his edge And fare on afoot would find gates of no gardens.”

She exhaled shakily, ignoring the sting of her back in favour of his voice.

“But the hill of dark underfoot diving, Closing overhead, the cold deep, and drowning...”

She stroked the short hairs at the back of his neck when his voice cracked again and he began to choke. Picking up the tune, she hummed along, unmoving except for her hand as she waited for him to calm again.

For a few moments, until her mind understood and adjusted, the sudden intensity of the growl that began to shake the air in her lungs was all consuming. It felt like she was drowning until she let her body move at its own pace, and she ignored what her mind told her. 

His words, to her melody, returned and helped to distract her from the sensation. 

“He is called Leviathan, and named for rolling, First created he was of all creatures, Sea-fright he is, and the shadow under the earth.”

With each bar, it felt like she could breathe easier. Every time he inhaled and more of his torso pressed against her, it drew the gasping dizziness out of her. She moved her arms further around him to connect as much skin to him as possible.

“Days there are, nonetheless, when he lies Like an angel, although a lost angel, no eye of man saw, but those who after him came to herit earth's emptiness.”

She felt him shudder, and she wanted to continue petting him, but she felt heavy against him. Her hands had become like lead weights. Had he always had this power over her? Could he do this with anyone? Did it matter when she wanted to continue floating away in the grief welling out of him?

“He makes no cry Though that light is a breath. The sea curling, Star-climbed, wind-combed, cumbered with itself still…” he sang, the words now barely making sound as his breath moved her hair. “As at first it was, is the hand not yet contented Of the Creator. And he waits for the world to begin.”

Leviathan fell silent; only the hum of pumps and fans could be heard around them. She didn’t move, content to lay slumped against him as he lost himself in thought.

The sound of the bell syphon draining for the fifth time finally prompted her to break their silence. “Do you want to stay like this for a bit longer?” she asked, feeling the spell his song had woven continuing to lift away slowly. 

“Hmm?”

“Or are you feeling brave enough to wrap your arms around me?” She felt his shoulders move under her elbows. “Oooh going all out I see.” 

The heat of his blush radiated into her cheek, but surprisingly, his tail slackened its most recent death grip on her. 

“At some point we should talk about Valentine’s Da—” he tried to say before she blanked his mind with her lips on his neck. “You can’t just—you’ve got to warn a guy!”

“Okay. Levi, I’m going to smooch your neck again.”

“ _ What _ ?” he asked, curling in on himself, only to pull her more tightly to him in the process. 

She’d never felt closer to him than now. “Very little reaction. Perfect,” she said, staring down at the cool tile of the floor. “Good work. I think I might even be able to hug you in public soon.” 

“There definitely wasn’t little reaction,” he muttered, though she expected she wasn’t meant to hear it.

She ignored the hard object pressed conspicuously between them.

“Why do you even want to touch the gross hikikomori?” he asked, self-loathing and frustration coating the words. 

“Levi…why are you so flustered by me in real life? When we were in the romance game with your brothers, you were less wary of me.” It was so much easier to ask him these questions when they didn’t have to look at one another. His warmth relaxed her and she stayed in his arms now out of comfort rather than a clinging need for air, as she had before.

“You’re real,” he said after a stretch of silence. He wet his dry lips before forcing the words out. “In games, I can always go back to a previous save, or try a different set of variables. I know they’re not real. I can do anything there.  _ Be _ anything there.”

“You’re the same Levia-chan here as there,” she said, sliding her fingers up his neck and around the base of his horns, threading them between each space in his coral-like crown.

He swallowed a whine when her fingers moved in his hair. “Well, you’re  _ you _ . So there’s _ that, _ ” he said.

Her eyelashes fluttered against the diamonds on his neck before she pulled back to put more weight on her knees. “I don’t know what _ you _ and  _ that _ means, but if it means I need to work harder to make you comfortable with me, then I won’t give up.”

He mumbled a soft noise that sounded like “Thanks.”

It was unlikely he’d meant to squeeze her thigh with his tail. 

“You have lots of little cuts all the way down your back,” he said, peering over her shoulder. “Why are you still hurt?”

“Human, remember?” she said with a wry laugh and flex of her fingers against his scalp. “If they’re not deep then they should completely seal over in a day or two, if I don’t keep breaking them open, that is. In a few weeks they’ll just be little scars.”

“Can I?” 

“Touch them? Sure, I guess? Just go slow,” she said, trying not to shy away from his fingers.

A cold sensation pulsed into her back, reaching its tendrils across the surface of her skin only to sink into the dry wounds. She let out a shriek directly next to his ear.

“Ah! Sorry!” he said when she clung to him, trying to escape the magic emanating from his palm. 

“No, it’s okay,” she said, and this time it was her turn to feel shy at a new sensation. She tried not to squim. “It’s just cold, but it’s better than the stinging.” 

“Moisture helps heal things,” he said as if that explained everything. “It’s agar based and it should stay on by itself, at least until it's time to take it off and re-annoint you again.” 

“Again?” she asked, trying to crane her neck to peek at what he was applying. She felt him freeze around her, and realized she shouldn’t have asked about next time.

His tail loosened from its place around her leg and she heard it _ ‘flump’ _ over the edge, where it disturbed boxes that he usually kept stashed under the tub.

“Here,” he said, hanging a small blue vial in front of her face, “It’s a minor potion.”

It hurt to reach for it, but the cold that Leviathan had slaked her back with was enough to numb the worst of the burning. “Why do you have a...” she began to ask. “You know, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure? A little lotion helps with fric—”

“Stop talking!” he said, his voice high and warbling.

“Okay, okay,” she said, trying not to laugh while she opened and drank down the potion. “Ugh. These things make me so sleepy all the time. Why is regeneration so tiring? You guys heal so easily.” She dropped the empty vial to the floor, and squeaked in surprise when Leviathan’s tail wrapped back around her leg. Apparently, that was  _ his _ leg now. ‘Good. Baby steps,’ she thought.

Leviathan rested his hand against the back of her neck, holding her in place. His breath was shaky before he kissed her temple, but she felt him relax into a Leviathan shaped puddle when she let out a soft, happy sigh over his shoulder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A portion of Levi's song was taken from this poem:  
> Leviathan by W.S. Merwin https://www.ronnowpoetry.com/contents/merwin/Leviathan.html
> 
> Hello my lovely readers!
> 
> If you haven't had a chance, please give my survey a quick glance. It shouldn't take more than two minutes (thirty seconds if you don't answer question four). Don't worry, there are only five questions. https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DD38R8B
> 
> If you have had a chance, I have added a fifth question, which you should be able to access still. If not, the survey is set up to let you take it more than once (since you might have a different opinion since I posted it in May 2020).


	86. Tickles and Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 47th Day, Thursday.
> 
> The long night of craziness is finally at an end.
> 
> Please expect another chapter tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HUUUUUUUGE Thank you to Dalektable who powered through two chapters for me this week!

_ “Okay, okay,” she said, trying not to laugh while she opened and drank down the potion. “Ugh. These things make me so sleepy all the time. Why is regeneration so tiring? You guys heal so easily.” She dropped the empty vial to the floor, and squeaked in surprise when Leviathan’s tail wrapped back around her leg. Apparently, that was  his leg now. ‘Good. Baby steps,’ she thought. _

_ Leviathan rested his hand against the back of her neck, holding her in place. His breath was shaky before he kissed her temple, but she felt him relax into a Leviathan shaped puddle when she let out a soft, happy sigh over his shoulder. _

**47th Day, Thursday.**

* * *

She dozed for a few minutes before she blinked awake again and huffed childishly. “I wish we could stay like this all day. You’re cozy.”

“I’m a demon. I’m not _cozy_.”

“You’re my sweet, cozy tadpole, but word for word, you sound like Mammon when you say that.” She wanted to smoosh his cheeks between her hands.

“How can you insult me like this?” he asked, whining, but readily playing into her mirth.

She smooched one of the diamonds on his neck, and he made a peevish noise at the back of his throat. His reaction sent her into a fit of sleepy giggles against his sensitive skin. 

The giggles shook her harder when he flailed, until finally he tightened his tail around her thigh enough to make her gasp.

Without warning, Leviathan pushed her up and away from him. “Did I hurt you? Are you okay?” His tail uncoiled from her leg rapidly.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just surprised,” she said, starting to laugh again. “Doubly surprised that your hands can cover this much of my bust. Good work.”

“GAHHH!” His eyes flitted up and down her body from naked shoulders to clothed hips, only his hands covering anything in between. “Where do I? I can’t move them without—but if I keep them there—’”

It was obvious that his brain was short circuiting, but she was impressed when he didn’t throw or drop her, returning her instead to her previous place draped over him. This time, his hands were trapped between them as he stared at the ceiling. 

“Well, I guess we’re just going to have to stay like this for a while now,” she said, waiting for him to remember to breathe. 

Eventually, she took pity on him and began to push away, about to cover herself properly when she saw his devious expression and felt his scaly tail slide past her calf. “Leviathan, you put that tail away!” Her limbs still leaden with potion fatigue, she tried to wriggle away. “Nooo! Not my feet! Quit it! Levi, I won’t forgive you! I swear I will steal one of your Ruri figurines.”

“How dare you say her name like that. Blasphemy!” he said, staring at the ceiling as he kept up the attack.

“You’re a demon, you should like blasphemy!” she said, squealing as she tried to kick away his tail and avoid his hands tickling at the sides of her ribs. She shrieked with laughter as she fought to get away. “I will only steal one of her accessories!” 

“That’s worse,” he said, vehemently. “You wouldn’t dare.” 

“You’re right. You’re right. I wouldn’t leave her with only one shoe. MERCY!”

He relented, but she watched as all of the blood drained rapidly from his face when he looked down to receive her surrender.

“Leviathan!  **You are not allowed to drop me** !” she ordered him as he held her hands over her head with his tail, her knees just barely off the bottom of the tub.

He squeezed his eyes shut, and covered them with his hands, trying his best to lower her slowly.

“Good job,” she said, more than a little breathlessly.

“Why aren’t you slapping me?” he asked, his words low and anguished.

“Do you want me to?” she asked, her confusion plain.

“No, I just. You are—and I—I have you like this.” He gestured with a wave of a hand, still keeping his eyes screwed shut.

“Yes, indeed you do,” she said as his tail lowered her hands to a place just behind her head. She waited, listening to the fans and the gurgle of the aquarium, and let her fingers trail over the strange covering on her back. “But I’m not worried.”

“What’s that supposed to mean!” he asked, opening his eyes only to quickly look away, the red of his embarrassment deepening enough to be seen easily in the blue light.

“It means you could hold me down, and I would still be the one to fuck you, not the other way around,” she said without a hint of bravado, unfazed that he hadn’t yet let her go. “Stop looking at me like that, you brat, it’s not a challenge. Keep that up and I’ll smooch you at breakfast in front of Asmodeus.”

His eyes closed again but it didn’t hide the terror her threat instilled. He rapidly recoiled and released her hands. 

She brought her arms up to cover her chest. “Well, as you now know,” she said, drawing out each word, “I’m not marked up anywhere except for my back.”

He cracked an eye open and pointed to her neck, unable to bring himself close enough to poke it. “What’s that then?”

“Not a wound.”

“It’s a hickey!”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Well, when one creature likes another creature, sometimes…”

“Argh! You know what I meant!” he said, looking firmly at Henry’s tank instead of at her. “Beel would never leave you like this.” 

She took his hands and guided his palms over her hips, stunning him into silence while he continued staring at the water without seeing.

“Hold this here, please,” she said, using his hands to slide the satin romper up her sides while she thought about her explanation. She slowly slipped her arms back into the straps. “Safe to look now.”

Jerking his hands away he pointed at her. “No more normie mind wipe tactics!”

“So, about that,” she said, her hand reaching to cover the marks at her neck. “I kind of...it’s...can I have your jacket?”

“What’s wrong with yours?” he asked, eyes narrowing suspiciously.

“You cut it in half.”

“ _ Fiiiiine _ ,” he said, materializing it before he helped her into the sleeves and quickly zipped the blue fabric together around her. Clearly the more covered she was, the easier this would go.

It felt like Leviathan was looking through her. It reminded her of his concentration when watching Sucre Frenzy performing live in front of him. She snuffed out whatever he was thinking by leaning forward to snuggle against him again. “Mmm. Cozy.”

“Demons aren’t cozy!” he said, but he was clearly too worn out to struggle away from her.

“Smells like cozy nerd.”

“You’re ignoring the question,” he said, snaking his tail between them and around her waist.

“Alright, Lord of Shadows. I have…feelings?” she said, pausing to clear her throat awkwardly, “for the twins, and they kind of like me too.” She was glad he couldn’t see her face while she waited for his reaction. Would he flip out? 

“Yeah, I know.”

She squeezed him tightly. “It makes me feel really confused.”

“It’ll be okay,” he said, tentatively patting her shoulder. 

The rhythm of it was all wrong but she appreciated the gesture. “You demons move too fast between emotions.” 

When Leviathan brought his arms around her, she tried not to tense. She let her head hang low over the side of the tub instead. If he could be brave, then so could she. “Honestly, I feel really stupid for holding on to things that just keep on hurting me. Sometimes I feel ashamed of my human-ness,” she said, “like it's my fault that I'm in between, but I know that's not right.”

“You mean Mammon.”

She nodded and sighed. “I’m used to it now, and that’s not good.” Closing her eyes, she pretended not to see, or feel, the start and stop of purple energy crackling around them.

“He’s in love with you,” Leviathan said.

How could he sound so confident about things like this, but also faint for twenty minutes over the existence of a boob? 

With less pain than before, she shrugged her shoulders. "It's possible to be madly in love with someone and still not be ready. It's not something I can force. There’s no reason for me to torture both of us over bad timing.” She squeezed Leviathan again. “My life is too short to spend it convincing anyone to love me. There's more love out there that  _ will _ be ready.” 

Feeling his breathing come faster, she tried to sit up. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have. This isn’t something you want to talk about, I’m sure.”

His arms matched the tension of his tail around her, and he pressed his chin to her shoulder to keep her from escaping, from seeing his disquiet. “No. The Lord of Shadows is always there to help Henry too. Just feel better and go to sleep.”

“You’re not mad?” she asked, feeling tears creep into her vision.

“If those two idiots make you happy…then it’s fine, but if they make you cry I reserve the right to feed them to Henry 1.0,” he said.

“Okay,” she said quietly before she let herself begin to drift back to sleep. 

* * *

“And...the Lord of Lechery said it best, ‘be careful when trying to fix a broken person, for you may cut yourself on their shattered pieces,’” he said, whispering it as she nodded off. “Mammon has a lot of pieces, but I’m not mad as long as you’re not committing seppuku for that dumbass.”

He felt his groin pulse and twitch painfully under her weight. Things had been so much easier in the sea. 

The hood of his jacket was folded under her cheek, where she rested on his shoulder. The layers of clothing now between them were helping him stay calm. 

Readjusting his position, Leviathan relaxed his head at the edge of the tub and used the coils of his tail to keep her hips further away from his. 

In her sleep, she took advantage of his movement to nuzzle back into his neck, exactly where she’d woken earlier. 

How could she be so cute and harmless while asleep, but so much of a demon when awake?  He  _ should _ be panicking at being her body pillow. He  _ should _ be calling Satan for help. He  _ should _ be helping Mammon strangle Belphegor pre-emptively. Instead, all he could think was that he needed to replace his cracked and broken bathtub because of the human. 


	87. RHC & Mortification

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some text time between the RHC and the adventure to the mostly empty dining room for breakfast.
> 
> 47th Day, Thursday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to Dalektable for putting her valuable time into editing this fiction <3

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**05:00**

**L3VI:** HEY LOOK AT YOUR PHONE LOOK AT YOUR PHONE LOOK AT YOUR PHONE LOOK AT YOUR PHONE!

 **Not Today, Satan:** What could you possibly need at this hour? I just got back from the breaking room. Your answer better not send me back there or you’re coming with me.

 **L3VI:** Lucifer left the normie with me. Like he just barged right in, and she crawled into my tub and patted my head and won’t wake up. What am I supposed to do?

 **AsmoBaby:** If she’s not moving, but still healthy, then you have nothing to worry about. Just lay back and enjoy it.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Why did Lucifer leave her with you?

 **L3VI:** I’m supposed to keep an eye on her today.

 **AsmoBaby:** Which means Mammon won’t be home. Works nicely for me. BUT don’t wake me up this early again. I do need _some_ beauty sleep even if I’m naturally this gorgeous. 

**Not Today, Satan:** Just let her sleep? 

**AsmoBaby:** You can always bring her over here. I’ll keep her warm.

 **L3VI:** Asmo! Keep it in your pants.

 **AsmoBaby:** Isn’t that the opposite of this club’s mission?

 **Not Today, Satan:** There’s no I in team, Asmo, but there is an I in ‘I’m going to kick your ass if you don’t stop pinging my phone.’ Go to sleep.

 **L3VI:** … Big help, you two.

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**07:00**

**L3VI:** AAAAAAAHHHHHHHASVUBYWEGUIN

 **L3VI:** HEYLOOKATYOURPHONE

 **L3VI:** HEY I MIGHT DIE

 **Not Today, Satan:** This had better be an emergency.

 **L3VI:** She...and I had to..so I. UUUURGH.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Well the universe hasn’t collapsed so I am going to assume you didn’t copulate with her.

 **L3VI:** IHadToCheckOnHerInjuriesBecauseLuciferDidn’tTellHerWhatWasWrongButThenWhenILookedSheDidn’tHaveABra!

 **Not Today, Satan:** That’s not an emergency. I’m going to find a way to drown you.

 **L3VI:** NOOOOO! You don’t understand! I panicked and it got worse!

 **AsmoBaby:** Alright! I’m listening now.

 **L3VI:** Don’t take pleasure in my pain!

 **AsmoBaby:** I think we both know I’ll take pleasure anyway I please.

 **L3VI:** UGH! Just help. I don’t know what to do when she wakes up again!

 **Not Today, Satan:** Spit it out. What’s the worst you possibly could have done?

 **L3VI:** I panicked and she put my hand on her 8008 and I passed out!

 **AsmoBaby:** Ahahaha! He means boob.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Asmo, give him a break. He _is_ the club president.

 **AsmoBaby:** As curious as I am as to how this came about, again, how is this a problem?

 **L3VI:** SheWouldn’tLetMeRemoveMyHandUntilIStoppedPassingOut!!!!!

 **Not Today, Satan:** I take it back. I’m returning to sleep.

 **L3VI:** Noooo! That’s not the part I need help wiht.

 **L3VI:** with*

 **AsmoBaby:** *Curious Demoji*

 **L3VI:** She kinda 

**L3VI:** Sorta

*Leviathan is typing*

 **Not Today, Satan:** Hurry up or I really am going to sleep.

 **L3VI:** She hugged me without her top on and I gave her an alginate dressing!

 **AsmoBaby:** I have to admit, I am impressed he didn’t die.

 **L3VI:** She hummed my temple hymn!

 **AsmoBaby:** Kinky~

 **L3VI:** WHAT?!?!

 **Not Today, Satan:** I don’t think that was a euphemism, Asmo.

 **AsmoBaby:** Disappointing, but sweet. Good for you for getting a cuddle.

 **Not Today, Satan:** To summarize, you had a shirtless hug while you played nurse, and she hummed a lullaby to you.

 **L3VI:** No! Well, yes, but no. We...may have had a tickle fight.

 **L3VI:** She smooched my neck and I panicked and my tail just grabbed her foot on its own.

 **AsmoBaby:** Like with tongue or???

 **Not Today, Satan:** Inquiring minds need to know.

 **L3VI:** I hate you both.

 **AsmoBaby:** This club, as fun as it is, might not be necessary.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Mammon.

 **L3VI:** UGHHHH! Why do I even ask for help here? 

**L3VI: I can’t even remember what order things happened in!**

**AsmoBaby:** Oh?

 **L3VI:** She insulted Ruri-chan, but then I thought I’d hurt her and pushed her away, but I forgot she wasn’t wearing a shirt ANDMYHANDSTHEYWEREINMYHANDS. 

**AsmoBaby:** Congratulations. 

**AsmoBaby:** *Applause Demoji*

 **AsmoBaby:** Satan, he’s doing far better than I ever expected. I think he means he touched her breasts.

 **AsmoBaby:** Pffft. I knew our little angel had it in her. We could just leave her to her own devices. 

**L3VI:** Shut up! What do I do? She fell back asleep on me again.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Just go back to sleep. Even she knows you’re haphephobic. 

**Not Today, Satan:** If she didn’t ask you for anything, or give you directions, then you’re fine. 

**AsmoBaby:** Still shirtless?

 **L3VI:** No, I helped her put it back on

 **L3VI:** *Blushing Demoji*

 **L3VI:** And she stole my jacket. So I have an extra layer of protection now!

 **Not Today, Satan:** She’s probably considered most of your reactions already. 

**Not Today, Satan:** She’s not the sort to act on instinct unless she’s about to die.

 **AsmoBaby:** Way to kill the mood.

 **AsmoBaby:** More importantly, these “smooches”: closed mouth? Open mouth? Tongue?

 **L3VI:** *Blue Lightning Demoji*

 **L3VI:** I’ll see you at breakfast.

 **L3VI:** Oh. And she said she has feelings for the twins and isn’t going to wait around for Mammon. He makes her sad.

 **Not Today, Satan: *** Shocked Demoji*

 **AsmoBaby: *** Shocked Demoji*

 **Not Today, Satan:** Why didn’t you lead with that?

* * *

Leviathan heard the knock at the door but ignored it in favour of the film playing quietly on his D.D.D.

When Satan poked his head in, a jellyfish plushie struck the wall next to his head with a soft ‘ _whoomph_ ’. The icy glare that followed was more of a deterrent but was missing the usual accompanying threats.

“I see you’re still watching over our resident champion,” Satan said, stepping into the room proper, stopping only when he noticed the human still wrapped in Leviathan’s tail. An amused smile flickered over his face before he hid it behind his polite mask. “I hope I’m not interrupting?”

“I don’t know, is he interrupting something?” she asked groggily, her words muffled against Leviathan’s neck.

Satan laughed at the wide mouth bass impression Leviathan was inadvertently making. 

“ _No!_ I mean, no,” Leviathan said, removing his hand from over her eyes. If she was awake, then he didn’t need to shield her from the glare of his D.D.D. any longer. 

To his mortification, she stretched languidly against him, making lewd sounds of enjoyment. He felt her lips on a scaled diamond at the base of his neck, and when he felt her tongue follow he was sure he was dying. ‘Part Celestial my tail!’ he thought. ‘She’s a demon through and through!’

“Might I borrow her later this afternoon?” Satan asked without batting an eye.

“Yeah, sure,” he said, his words barely English for the amount of gurgle to them. “I can tape _‘The Battle Princess of the Cybernetics Temple’_ at two.”

“Two it is,” Satan said, pausing to see if their human would do more than stretch sleepily. He couldn’t withhold his smirk any longer, and its existence easily translated into his tone. “Well, don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

“That doesn’t leave me with much, _Professor_ ,” she said before covering her yawn with the sleeve of Leviathan’s borrowed jacket.

It wasn’t often that Satan was at a loss for words, but now he only blushed, remembering how she’d teased him about his rope play. Turning around, he headed for the door. “Breakfast is being served. I’ll meet you down there,” he said, shutting the door swiftly behind him.

“Do we have to get up?” she asked her living pillow.

“ _You_ definitely have to get up,” he said, scandalized. “How could you—why would you—he was right there! And your tongue!” Out of the corner of his eye he saw her adjust the hood of his jacket to cover her face. He felt more than heard the _‘hmph!’_ against his skin.

“You demons are so confusing,” she said, muttering to herself while hidden. “What is the physical degree of affection amongst demons for friendship? ‘Cause I am getting so many different levels and combinations.” She huffed again. “When they’re mixed together there’s no way for me to make human equivalencies.”

“ _You’re_ confused?” he asked, his tone incredulous. “You just licked me!”

“Leviathan, you licked an entire package of tattoos onto my nearly naked body,” she said, tugging on his ear as she spoke. “Now, is that friendly, or is that more than friendly? Am I not to return that affection because of your discomfort, or because it’s more than friendly?”

I—well…”

“Levia- _chaaaan_ ,” she whispered to him, feeling the urge to make him stutter more, enjoying the tiny current of magic she felt when she moved against him. “Are you telling me you were just playing with my body?”

The sultry way she said it had him imagining things he had no right to be thinking about. What could he possibly say to that? She’d never come play videogames with him again no matter how he answered. 

“Levi, **I command you not to faint this morning** ,” she said.

He was alert, uncomfortably alert.

“I just don’t want you to keel over when I get up,” she said, not that his limbs had moved to uncage her. “I’m sorry for teasing you.”

He nodded silently, and she watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed.

“Maybe sometime today we should work out some boundaries for what’s okay?” she asked, giving her words time to sink in. “The last thing I want is Mammon trying to swing you around by your tail.”

A snort of derision came from Leviathan, and a sense of normalcy began to creep back in around them. 

‘I shouldn’t be playing with him. Making him flustered isn’t worth wrecking this,’ she thought, guilt biting into her. ‘I fell asleep on him after essentially proclaiming my love for three demons that weren’t him, and then proceeded to lick him. Good job, self. Way to go. Queen of mixed signals over here.’ 

He still hadn’t moved, so she tapped at his chest before she pushed away from him. Lifting herself slowly, she gave him a chance to untangle his limbs from around her. “Are we still good?” she asked.

Hoisting them both out of the tub, Leviathan planted a kiss on the top of her head before she could react. “We’re perfect,” he said, repeating her calm words of encouragement. “Good work, my Henry.” 

Tail still wrapped around her middle from their bathtub extraction, Leviathan opened the door and began to walk quickly down to breakfast.

“Wait, Levi, I can walk! Put me down!” She covered her eyes as they moved much faster than her sleepy brain was willing to compute. “Leviathan!” she said, practically hissing his name at his back. 

It was Asmodeus who came to her rescue. Uncovering her eyes and blinking owlishly in the light of the dining room, she heard the unmistakable sound of his sweet voice.

“Levi, you’ve got a little something there.”

She could see Leviathan’s hand reach up towards his face, and she shook her head in disbelief. ‘There’s no point in sulking about it,’ she thought. ‘It’s not the same as when the others cart me around; he’s still working on physical contact. I doubt he even realizes I’m here after he melted his own brain by praising me.’

“No, no, not quite there. A little to your right,” Asmodeus said, trying not to laugh as Leviathan’s hand moved over his mouth.

“Look at your tail, you idiot,” Satan said from the end of the table.

“AHH!”

She gave a small wave and tried her best not to laugh in his face, but he was making it exceptionally difficult. 

Panicking, he tried to cover his eyes with both hands and the tip of his tail, not pausing to realize that it would only bring her against his side.

“Oh for Diavolos’ sake…” she said, “Leviathan, put your tail away and sit down for breakfast, or I’ll make good on my threat.”

Tail gone, eyes wide, he scurried to his chair.

Asmodeus watched her with a predatory interest as she tugged Leviathan’s jacket down to once again cover the black satin underneath. “Oh, do tell,” he said.

“Thank you for the meal,” she said, pointedly ignoring him as she began filling her plate. She glanced around to be sure before she clanged her spoon against her glass. “Since Lucifer isn’t here this morning, I think it’s safe to present arms.”

Asmo pulled out a compact and D.D.D. without further encouragement, and she wasn’t sure from where, but Satan had a book in front of him by the time she looked over. She knew Leviathan would already be enthralled by the screen of his D.D.D. and that small talk would no longer be an issue.

A buzzing sensation against her side had her digging into her borrowed jacket’s pocket. She fished out the offending object only to find her own D.D.D. Without delay she opened it and began scrolling through messages as she ate. 

The first order of business was to reassure the other exchange students of her survival. Luke had been exceptionally eager to get her attention with sixteen unread messages, and it was only nine-thirty. 

Afterward, she found herself nervously tapping her fingers against the tabletop. She’d meant to tell Lucifer about the chat logs that kept appearing, the ones she shouldn’t be privy to, but he wouldn’t be home until much later she was sure.

“Hey Levi?” she asked, as she set all of the chats she wasn’t meant to be in to ‘unread’. “Can you look this over for me? I’ve been trying to ignore it and a few others, but it seems like something that might be important now.”

All eyes were on her as she tossed the D.D.D. to him. She waited, hoping she was overreacting. Sure it was a breach of privacy, but maybe it was just some sort of glitch? Karasu had never led her wrong, but nothing ever seemed to be a coincidence in this place. She watched as Leviathan’s eyes bugged out of his head.

“When did you—how long have you—how many? No, never mind. Don’t send anything else!” he said, as he continued to scroll.

She ate slowly, waiting for whatever was supposed to happen next. Glancing at Satan and Asmodeus she could tell Leviathan’s preoccupation had been enough to drag them out of their own worlds.

“ _Cheilopogon,_ ” Leviathan said, still looking at the device in his hands.

Satan and Asmoeus stopped eating entirely as they watched a floating ball of soft, blue light approach the table. 

If she squinted, it looked like it might have fins inside the hazey bubble, but the light moved in such a way that it bothered her eyes, as if it were vibrating and she couldn’t track it to pin its shape down. She squeezed her eyes shut a few times, trying to blink away the discomfort.

Hand outstretched to greet the creature, Leviathan sheltered it in his palm when it arrived, and for a time, they both looked at the screen together.

She was beginning to feel a bit exposed with how they were staring at her communications. Just as she was about to say something, the creature wobbled in its sphere of light, turning around. Only Asmodeus and Satan’s calm demeanor kept her from knocking over her chair and swatting at the blue light; It looked like it was sucking light out of Leviathan’s face. Was that a tail swaying behind it?

Then, as quickly as it had come, it fluttered away

“Don’t worry. It’s being looked into. Just don’t use the messenger function until you get the all clear,” Leviathan said, about to return the device. “Wait. Why is _this_ your background?”

She was sure she’d stopped breathing. No one was supposed to see the picture of Lucifer sleeping in her room, dishevelled and sweet. “Why is your messenger a fish that swallowed a nightlight?”

“Who cares what my mal'akh looks like! Why _this?_ ” Leviathan gestured impotently at the device with his free hand.

Saying nothing she held out her hand, outwardly calm and waiting for him to hand it over. 

Asmodeus had her D.D.D. before it could make it to her. He squealed with delight. 

“Does Mammon know you have this? He’d try and sell it within seconds. Wait, does Lucifer know you have this?”

“No and _no_. Now give that back! Not for prying eyes!” she said.

“Except me and Levi!”

She glowered at him.

“And Satan!” Satan said, clapping his hands and holding them up. The D.D.D. arched through the air and across the table, where it landed safely in his grasp.

“What?” she asked, throwing up her hands defensively at Satan’s scrutiny. He returned the device to her. “You can’t tell me you wouldn’t have snapped a picture of Lucifer sleeping too. I’ve had plenty of chances to and I kept the most _clothed_ one.”

The silence practically ate the air in the room, sucking it out of her lungs.

“My room. After breakfast,” Asmodeus said, his excited voice holding a note of steel that told her there would be no wiggling out of it. 

Her shoulders sagged in defeat as she decided to sit out the debate between Leviathan and Asmodeus over whose room she would be spending the rest of the day sleeping in. At some point Asmodeus began threatening to “Asmofy” him.

When there was no clear winner after fifteen minutes, and her plate was nearly clean, she chimed in as well. “You know, Levi, every good manga has a makeover component of some type.”

He was not convinced, and she waited until cutlery was about to be thrown. 

“Does _The Battle Princess_ get a power-up makeover?” she asked innocently. Asmofying was such a loaded term. Magical girl makeovers, however, were something else entirely.

Some pampering, even if she was asleep during it, didn’t sound horrible; there was no doubt in her mind that Asmodeus would dote on her while he prodded at Leviathan. She probably looked like she’d picked a fight with a Night Hag and lost. Turning on the selfie feature on her D.D.D., it was clear the camera didn’t disagree. 

Outwardly, she watched Leviathan grudgingly agree to the plan; Inwardly, she knew, he probably thought it was a small price to pay for his brain not to explode when she needed help getting dressed later.


	88. Before Show and Tell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before MC gives her phone to Leviathan, she made sure to reassure the other exchange students that she was indeed still alive.

**The Angels Chat (3):**

**46th Day, Wednesday**

**11:59**

**AngelLuke:** Is everything okay? Devilgram is blowing up about a human getting injured!!

 **AngelLuke:** Solomon isn’t answering his D.D.D. either!

 **DDSimeon:** Yes, plseupdate us when youure able.

**47th Day, Thursday**

**00:43**

**AngelLuke:** Are you okay? Are you asleep?!

 **AngelLuke:** Please call as soon as you see this message.

**47th Day, Thursday**

**01:26**

**AngelLuke:** If they've hurt you, I swear I will have a legion of angels here within the hour!

 **AngelLuke:** If you’re okay and you’re just ignoring my messages I will never make cookies for you again!

**47th Day, Thursday**

**02:08**

**AngelLuke:** I heard that the human eviscerated three demons, so it probably was Solomon.

 **AngelLuke:** Hopefully, that doesn’t cause too much of an interspecies incident…

 **AngelLuke:** But if it does, I won’t be invited back for a second year. Actually, this situation is win-win.

**47th Day, Thursday**

**02:49**

**AngelLuke:** Solomon just came home! 

**AngelLuke:** He says it wasn’t him!

 **AngelLuke:** PLEASE ANSWER 

**AngelLuke:** I’m going to the House of Lamentation right now! 

**47th Day, Thursday**

**03:29**

**AngelLuke:** Simeon just gave me my D.D.D. back after they untied me. 

**AngelLuke:** Solomon is lucky I’m so forgiving. 

**AngelLuke:** Apparently, there was a press release that says you’re fine, but I want to hear it from you. 

**47th Day, Thursday**

**09:30**

**MC:** Good Morning, Luke! Sorry I worried you all!

 **MC:** Also, I don’t know if I would consider any of the ones I killed as "eviscerated". 

**MC:** I’m not an expert though.

 **AngelLuke:** Praises to our Heavenly Father! You’re alive!

 **AngelLuke:** Wait, what’s Michael’s favourite pastry?

 **AngelLuke:** No, that’s too easy.

 **AngeLuke:** What colour are my undergarments?

 **MC:** Royal Purple

 **AngelLuke:** Well, at least that embarrassing incident has been of use.

 **AngelLuke:** Did you remember to pick up your Human Esoteric Lupin Pigment Management Exam paper from class?

 **MC:** Thank you, Luke. I don’t currently need rescue. I’ll see you at the party, okay?

 **AngelLuke:** If you call, you don’t even have to say anything. We’ll be over there right away.

 **MC:** What would I do without you? I may have to petition to keep you on as my guardian angel

 **MC:** *Kiss Blowing Demoji*

 **DDSimeon:** We look forward to seeing you there.

* * *

**Gotta Catch 'Em All Chat (2):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**09:32**

**MC:** Solomon do you know how to remove parental controls on a D.D.D.?

 **SongOfSolomon:** *Flirty eyebrow raise demoji*

 **MC:** Really?

 **SongOfSolomon:** Why do you ask?

 **MC:** I lent Simeon my D.D.D. last week to review notes when he misplaced his and ever since...

 **SongOfSolomon:** And ever since?

 **MC:** Really? You're going to make me type it out?

 **SongOfSolomon:** And ever since?

 **MC:** Solomon. I still need to do my alchemy homework and it thinks Fuchsine is a naughty word.

 **SongOfSolomon:**...And yet Asmodeus still thinks you're interesting. Amazing.

 **MC:** Thanks for that.

 **SongOfSolomon:** So did you go back for seconds?

 **MC:** Solomon! Shouldn't you be asking me why I'm still alive?

 **SongOfSolomon:** You'll tell me eventually. Why waste my question on something you'll tell me soon enough?

 **MC:** I'll have some questions to trade with you at the party. Prepare yourself!

 **SongOfSolomon:** I'm going to take that as a tentative yes.

 **MC:** This is the real reason you and Asmo get along, isn't it?

 **SongOfSolomon:** *Whistling Demoji*

* * *

**Puppy Play Date (2):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**09:40**

**AngelLuke:** Don’t believe Simeon’s relaxed messages. He had his sword out!


	89. That's No Excuse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our Sleepy MC is just trying to get through her day while the RHC learn to work as a unit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a massive thank you to Dalektable for beta reading this, and for her invaluable insights.

**47th Day, Thursday**

_“Does The Battle Princess get a power-up makeover?” she asked innocently. Asmofying was such a loaded term. Magical girl makeovers, however, were something else entirely._

_Some pampering, even if she was asleep during it, didn’t sound horrible; there was no doubt in her mind that Asmodeus would dote on her while he prodded at Leviathan. She probably looked like she’d picked a fight with a Night Hag and lost. Turning on the selfie feature on her D.D.D., it was clear the camera didn’t disagree._

_Outwardly, she watched Leviathan grudgingly agree to the plan; Inwardly, she knew, he probably thought it was a small price to pay for his brain not to explode when she needed help getting dressed later._

  
  


The lively banter around the breakfast table continued, but she yawned whenever they asked for her input, and they were too impatient to win their newest argument to wait for her. If she’d realized that yawning was a free pass, she would have started using it months ago.

Turning her thoughts over, again and again, she tried to place the night’s events in order. Did she talk to Satan? She remembered hearing his voice. Asmodeus was there for the freaky things that could warp through solid matter. Where was he at The Fall when she was taken? 

Lost in breakfast and her own thoughts, it took her time to realize that Satan had disappeared, as had most of the plates. Holding a small bowl of yoghurt close to her chest, she looked down, noting her own plate was missing. 

Thinking back, she remembered the first time she’d had to use a healing potion. Her right pinky had been dangling by a stretched tendon still attached to the knuckle when Mammon had forced her to drink. She’d cried pitifully while he’d rubbed her back, until morbid fascination held her as her finger reattached itself. 

The tiredness she felt was just her body catching up to the healing that had occurred; it took energy to regenerate and she wondered what would happen when she ran out of energy. It was only fatigue but she still hated the bone deep weariness. 

She set down the bowl, and pushed her seat back, not trusting herself to multitask in her tired state. All evidence of her breakfast had disappeared; she frowned at the bare tablecloth in front of her. The only hint of the thief was a rapid ‘ _pitter patter’_ that faded away towards the kitchen. 

The Little Demons must’ve liked their presents more than she’d anticipated if they were coddling her like this.

“Dearest, we need to get you out of _this_ ,” Asmodeus said, gesturing toward her borrowed jacket, as if he were trying to fling something gross off of the tips of his fingers.

She startled at his sudden nearness. She breathed in the warm, floral scent of Asmodeus. Covering her yawn with her hand she nodded. “Gotta go to my room first,” she said, and tottered away.

* * *

With all the scrapes she got into, she was surprised that she wasn’t used to this by now. The unnatural feeling that came with magical healing made her want to nest until she was whole again. She knew everything was where it should be, but somehow it wasn’t right; it was as if her fingertips were always a centimeter away from where she was trying to reach, or her steps always just a little off stride, like a wobbly silhouette of herself was what was interacting with the world around her, and not herself.

Hearing the door of her bedroom click closed behind her, she spun and stumbled. She recognized the serpentine tail around her arm, keeping her from tumbling to the floor. It was readily recognizable without conscious thought. She pushed her messy hair back from her eyes to better see Leviathan and noticed he was looking anywhere but at her. The tail slithered away from her hand and she turned back to her task with a small “thanks.” 

At her desk, she tugged out a stack of message cards and a pen, and stuffed them into her pants pockets, intent on using the Little Demons as messengers if she was going to be robbed of her D.D.D. chat privileges. 

When she walked past him and back toward the hallway, Leviathan was still tapping away on his D.D.D.. “Thanks for doing my laundry, by the way,” she said as she opened the door.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Normie.”

“Levi, I know it was you. No one else would organize clothing by the colour code needed to open the last puzzle in Kingdom of Tales.” She didn’t need to look back to know that his face was red; the sound of his embarrassed gurgle told her everything she needed to know. “Can I assume you’re the one who cleaned up my room, too?”

Leviathan’s footsteps behind her, and the click of her door, let her know he was still there and following, even if he wasn’t answering her.

“However...” she said, ignoring his silence, “I noticed my undergarments are missing. Let me know if they turn up?”

He fell over himself before his question tumbled out. “ _What?_ I don’t have—What are you insinuating?” He was loud at first but squeaking with indignation by the end.

She continued walking down the hall at her own slow pace. “Come on, Levi. I want to sleep, and Asmo’s bed isn’t going to come to me.” The image of Asmodeus’ bed squeezing out his door invaded her mind: the canopy trailing behind it as it galloped down the corridors, sending petals flying, and losing frills as it went. She laughed to herself. Belphegor wished he had the kind of power that would summon a bed.

“Don’t laugh! I’m not some perverted panty thief!” Leviathan shouted at her retreating back. 

Coming to a stop, she pivoted to take in the beginnings of his tantrum. “What are you talking about?” she asked, feigning ignorance over her accidental riling. “Remind me to ask whoever is on laundry duty later?” Disarming his short fuse was not something she could easily manage right now, but she was trying with what little reserves of energy and patience she had left. “Let’s go. I’m sleepy.” 

She knew better than to hold out her hand to him as she would to one of the others. She’d already pushed his limits for the day, far beyond his usual limits, in fact. It was a miracle he hadn’t had a melt down. She’d need to apologize to him later when her brain wasn't sludge.

He nodded sulkily, and without another word between them, they made their way to Asmodeus’ room.

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**09:35**

**L3VI:** I WISH DEMONS COULD DIE OF EMBARRASSMENT.

 **L3VI:** Why aren’t either of you looking at your phone. Didn’t you just see me carry the human without realizing it?

 **L3VI:** This can’t be real life.

 **L3VI:** This a totally different dimension of craziness we’re talking about!

 **L3VI:** What am I gonna do? I just made an idiot of myself!

**L3VI: LOOKATYOURPHONES**

**09:50**

**L3VI:** OH no. Oh no no no no no.

 **L3VI:** Her D.D.D. is able to read a whole bunch of our private chats.

**L3VI: THANK DIAVOLO! This chat isn’t one of them!**

**L3VI:** It looks like she hasn’t read any of them, but the ones with Simeon in them are hilarious! 

**L3VI:** He still can’t type. There’s one where it’s all CAPS LOCKED! 

**L3VI:** I sent Cheilopogon to Lucifer to let him know what’s happening with her phone.

 **L3VI:** I’m hoping it’s just a glitch in the system and not some sort of spyware gone crazy. If it is...well, that’s a discussion for a different chat.

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**10:03**

**AsmoBaby:** So what was this threat she was going to make good on?

 **L3VI:** OH _now_ you answer!

 **Not Today, Satan:** Care to explain how you forgot you were carrying a human in your tail?

 **L3VI:** I don’t know, do I care to, PROFESSOR? 

**Not Today, Satan:** Point taken.

 **AsmoBaby:** What did I miss?!

* * *

Asmodeus’ dramatic sigh met them on arrival. “I thought maybe you'd forgotten about me..." he said, pouting for a moment before surging forward to pick her up and leave Leviathan to mutter in their wake.

She knew the way she was snuggling into Asmodeus’ hold was giving away her needy mood, but she couldn’t bring herself to care, even if he used it against her later. Right now, the soft curve of his neck was the best place to hide. 

“Nggh.” Her protest was a muffled grunt. “How can you be so cheerful this early?”

“Tut tut, my dear. It’s well after ten.” He set her on his bed. “However, that monstrosity,” he said, motioning once again to Leviathan’s jacket, “is not touching my sheets.”

She laughed at his sass. “Fine,” she said, fumbling with the zipper tabs. “I give up! It zips in both directions. Levi, how do I get this contraption off?”

“Out of the way,” Leviathan said. His words were grumbled and his face was pinched. Brushing Asmodeus away with a swish of his tail, he took his place next to the bed and knelt. "Listen up! It's not everyday I lend out my jacket, all right?" he said, but as loud and intimidating as his words were, he was exceptionally careful while he collected both of the zipper pulls and unlocked the garment. 

“ _Thaaaaank you_ , Levi.” She tried not to smile too widely when he touched her hand while retrieving his clothing.

As he pulled away, she kicked off her sweatpants, leaving her in only her romper-pajamas. This time she did laugh when he spun around to avoid watching her strip.

“What is wrong with you? You’re practically naked!” Leviathan said, letting Asmodeus barge in front of him; he used his weaker brother like a demonic shield against the sight of her thighs. 

“And this is why we say the world will end if Levi ever has sex,” Asmodeus said, tossing the hair out of his eyes. 

They made it too easy to laugh; she had to actively stuff down the chortle that was trying to escape. No doubt her unlady-like noise would amuse Asmodeus, but she wouldn’t laugh at Leviathan. “Mmkay. Sleep now,” she said, swinging her legs up onto the bed.  
  
“Oh no you don’t, my dear!” Asmodeus said, his hand suddenly under her mid-back, keeping her from laying down. “Don’t you think for a second that you’re going to sleep before you cleanse and moisturize. I’m sure those three didn’t even bother with it.”

She wasn’t even sure which three demons he meant. Her belly was full of warm food, there was a soft bed under her, and her mind and soul were trying to catch up with the handiwork of the potion in her body. “Asmo, keeping humans awake after a certain point is considered torture,” she said, her body beginning to flush with an uncomfortable mix of heat and cold, demanding she rest.

“Good thing we’re in the Devildom then,” he said, righting her. “Torture fits right in.” He side-eyed Leviathan before stepping away from them both. “Keep her upright until I come back!” he called back as he left to raid his supplies.

The warning was not unnecessary. As soon as Asmodeus turned away, she began to slide her legs under the covers with a sly look that would have otherwise been buried by her usual filter for decorum.

“Gah!” Leviathan wrapped his tail around her middle, once again meeting the black satin of her romper. “Are you trying to torture me too?” he asked.

“Sorry, Levi,” she said contritely, steadying herself with her hands against his tail to sit back up. “You can let—” A yawn stole her words away. “You can let go now.”

His tail retreated from her rapidly. “I’m not a pervert,” he said, stuffing his hands in his coat pockets.

She blinked at him, beyond worn out from the morning’s antics. “What are you talking about?”

“Your undergarments. I don’t have them. I’m not a complete pervert.”

“Oh,” she said. She pressed her hands into the mattress to keep her balance. “I didn’t say you had them, just...if you find them, let me know.” She tilted her head in thought. “Actually, it’s likely Asmo threw them out.” 

Hands over his eyes he turned away from her. His soft “Why do I talk?” barely registered for her.

“My Dear One, did you break him already?” Asmodeus asked. The speed at which he could saunter was alarming.

She shook her head, knowing better than to talk when he had any sort of cleanser nearby or in hand. He moved too fast for her to dodge, and a mouth full of cleanser was not on her list of things to have today. 

“What’s this I hear about perverts?”

“NOTHING!” Leviathan said, still staring at the wall.

“Asmo, where are all of my pajamas?” she asked instead, a warning in her voice. “Also, have you seen my undergarments?”

“Did you not like this one?” he asked, fiddling with the fine strap on her shoulder.

“This was _just_ enough to cover me,” she said, pointing at him as he moved away to open a thin, white case.

“You’re right, you should have gone with something more sheer!”

“Asmo!” she said, her voice not nearly annoyed enough to deter him as he handed her a damp cleansing wipe. “I had to wear this while I slept in Lucifer’s room.” If she was lucky, her whine would be enough to win him over today.

“I’m not seeing the problem.”

“In. His. Bed.”

A ‘ _crack_ ’ in the air brought her eyes up to Leviathan’s tail. He’d twitched it too quickly and it had broken through the air like a whip.

“Not all of us are perverts, Asmo!” Leviathan said, still unwilling to turn around.

“Oh _, aren’t_ we?”

“He kind of has you there, Levi.”

“Not you too! You can’t gang up on me,” he said, his voice becoming petulant. She was surprised he hadn’t stomped his foot.

“To be fair, he doesn’t act like much of a pervert outside of the virtual world,” Asmodeus said, taking away the used cleansing sheet and returning to the bathroom. 

“Pffft!” she said, when Asmodeus had left the room again, kicking her feet lazily, back and forth over the edge of the bed. “He doesn’t know I’ve read your D.D.D. conversation about anime boobs. You two went on for hooooours.”

Leviathan whirled around, his eyes wide and his mouth wider.

She tilted her head thoughtfully. “To be fair, the two hours of back and forth about the physics of their movement was quite interesting.”

“But—but—but they all said unread,” he said, hissing the words quietly and frantically glancing back to the bathroom door.

It was impossible to keep her saucy smile from emerging, and she bit her lip to keep from laughing loudly. When she raised her eyebrows at him, he collapsed to his knees and leaned forward to hide his face in the mattress and bedskirt.

“How much did you read?” he whispered desperately.

“ _All of it_ ,” she said, her words something just shy of cruel. “All of them.”

“You’re allowed to doze there,” Asmodeus said, his voice calling out from the bathroom, “but we’re propping you up so you can help me with Levi’s transformation.” He rounded the corner once more, this time carrying a basket of lotions, potions and contraptions.” Oh, and of course we’ll need to discuss tomorrow’s outfits.”

“Tomorrow?” she asked.

“The party,” they said in unison. Leviathan’s dread drowned out Asmodeus’ excitement despite still being ensconced, face first, in the mattress.

“Oh, I didn’t know if it was still on...” she said.

Leviathan released an agitated scoff as he beat a hasty retreat and plopped himself down in an armchair. “Parties stop for no one, especially not after an attack.” He pulled his D.D.D. out and glued his eyes to the screen.

“Gotta prove to the Devildom that I’m still alive and well then?” she asked, her voice dull and weary. “Well, at least I’ll have looked like a princess again before I die another horrific death.”

“ _Stop that_!” Asmodeus said, his tone angry, and close enough to make her start. “No one is ever going to lay so much as a finger on you again.” 

The pained expression on his face told her that he was holding himself back from wrapping himself around her. The wrinkle-inducing scrunch of his eyebrows, and the subtle slackening of his jaw, were telltale signs of his restraint that she’d decoded over time.

As he dabbed lotion onto her skin, brushing it up from her décolletage to her face, she looked at him, quietly watching. Now would be the best time to ask, but how did she go about asking why he abandoned her to a slow death? Even with demons, that wasn’t something you just _said_.

When she looked back down without meeting his eyes, he took her chin in his hand, applying something with a sponge before pausing to hold her attention. “How much have you been told about what happened last night?” Asmodeus let go of her, dropping his hands to his sides, searching her face for something other than dry skin.

“Nothing, but as far as I know, Mammon isn’t in the dungeons, and Levi and Satan didn’t dismember you this morning,” she said. “Although, it’s possible Mammon is locked away and you’re not telling me.” Her words were indifferent, but she was looking at her hands, trying to figure out how to put the pain in her chest back to sleep.

“Leviathan! You didn’t tell her anything?”

“She was asleep!”

“ _Hmmph_ ! That’s no excuse,” Asmodeus said, glaring at her babysitter before he picked up a brush. “Here, let’s prop you up, my Dear One. Lean forward and I’ll brush out your hair while _Leviathan_ tells you all about last night.”

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**11:30**

**Not Today, Satan:** Don’t forget, I have called “dibs” on the human’s time for two.

 **AsmoBaby:** I have to transform Leviathan from Gross Otaku to Handsome Pacu, you’re not leaving me any time with her!

 **L3VI:** Hey!

 **L3VI:** I’m only here so you don’t molest her, and so that I don’t lose consciousness when she has to get dressed. 

**Not Today, Satan:** Try to remember to feed and water her; humans can’t skip meals as easily as we do, and she’s still recovering.

 **L3VI:** Any excuse to escape these perfumes will be taken.

 **AsmoBaby:** I’m going to cut off your thumbs. Stop complaining. You and her are going to love this look.

 **Not Today, Satan:** By the way, Belphegor taught her how to better understand Infernal. So keep in mind that she may know what you’re saying under your breath. I don’t need her crying in my room because of you two.

 **L3VI:** *Shocked Demoji* Oh no….

**11:45**

**L3VI:** Okay. I’ve calmed down now.

 **L3VI:** No! I haven’t! WHY?!

 **Not Today, Satan:** While not ideal for us, it does offer her another level of awareness and protection. I can’t say I’m upset at Belphegor for it… 

**Not Today, Satan:** Rather, I wish I’d thought of it first.

**12:00**

**L3VI:** Serious question time. I did her laundry during my clean up last night. This morning she told me her undergarments are missing. Is there anything I should know?

 **AsmoBaby:** I just replace them with something smaller, or more transparent, until she scolds me. Lather, rinse, repeat.

 **Not Today, Satan: “** Serious question time.” I realized, while doing dishes, that our human didn’t seem to be in as much pain when Belphegor and I were trying to breach her command not to enter the pool compared to when we were straining against her orders in the hallway. Thoughts?

 **AsmoBaby:** Don’t you just love that he said “our human?” ❤️

 **L3VI:** I was too distracted to tell if she was in other pain...

 **L3VI:** *Crying Demoji*

 **L3VI:** But the water did move without my command. I even tried to stop it but it only slowed.

 **Not Today, Satan:** You didn’t think to mention this to any of us?

 **AsmoBaby:** *Shocked Demoji*

 **L3VI:** What? It was only the day before yesterday! A lot’s happened in between...I was just really mad and not concentrating enough.

 **Not Today, Satan:** Alright, RHC meeting in the common room at 14h00 to discuss this. I’ll read with her afterwards.

 **AsmoBaby:** *Saluting Demoji*

 **L3VI:** You didn’t answer my question about undergarments, Satan.

 **Not Today, Satan:** I won’t dignify that with a response.


	90. Asmofied

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC attempts to sleep for the day while Asmodeus coaches Leviathan through his own personal Magical Girl Transformation.  
> Unsurprisingly, she's not allowed to stay asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone for your patience with this chapter. Real Life struck and as a result, this came out a little later.  
> Big thank you to Dalektable for taking the time out to read through this not once but twice!

“What do you think, Dearest?” Asmodeus asked, nudging his human, who was flopped forward over a mountain of pillows.

“Mmsspretty,” she said, trying to blink the sleep from her eyes.

“Asmo, I’m not supposed to be _pretty_ ,” Leviathan said. “Ruri-chan is pretty. Flowers are pretty.”

“Hush! She clearly meant me,” Asmodeus said before quickly covering Leviathan’s eyes. 

She couldn’t see Leviathan with Asmodeus now between them, but she suspected it was for the best. She’d forgotten to hold her romper to her chest when she’d pushed herself upright, and Leviathan would have likely had a nosebleed on principle alone.

“I told you this was a terrible idea,” Leviathan muttered.

“Just pretty?” Asmodeus asked, before swiftly turning around to point at her, his accusation loud. “AH! What have I said about rubbing at your eyes!”

She dropped her hands from her face, shocked by the sudden outburst. Even what she saw of Leviathan’s twitchy tail had frozen in place. 

“The skin around our eyes is thin and delicate,” she said robotically, remembering the many, many lectures she’d already received on the topic. “Rubbing the eyes can result in damage to the blood vessels under the skin's surface, causing dark circles.” She carefully reached up and brushed at the accumulated sleep under her lashes before looking around properly. 

The room was much as she’d left it before succumbing to sleep. There was clothing strewn across nearly every surface now, and a myriad of bottles and charms littering the vanity that she couldn’t begin to guess the contents of, but it seemed they’d managed not to fight in favour of letting her sleep. It was already a miracle that she’d woken up in the same place she’d fallen asleep. Now if only she knew what they’d been up to while she was out cold, she could relax once more.

Her eyes finally comprehending Leviathan, now no longer shielded by Asmodeus’ body, she stared, blinking a few times to make sure she wasn’t still asleep. “Asmo, what have you done?” she whispered, momentarily forgetting to breathe back in. Both of her hands swept up to cover her mouth in shock.

“Ugh, I know,” Leviathan said, cringing. “I look like a normie.”

“ _Psh_. My work is flawless, and we’re only half done.” He shooed Leviathan’s wandering tail away from wrinkling his pant leg.

“Asmo,” she whispered, “I’m never going to be able to unsee this. You’ve made him too cute!” It was impossible to tell if it was the sleep deprivation or the styling, but she wanted to reach out with grabby hands and snuggle the life out of her shy demon.

“ _What_?” Leviathan squeaked out, his face reddening rapidly.

Asmodeus shifted his weight to jutt his hip out, like the diva he was, as he basked in the sudden praise. “See, I told you. I can work with any canvas.” Hair brush in hand, he motioned with it, nearly hitting Leviathan in the face. 

“Levi, I know Asmo only pinned your hair back so he could get at your face,” she said, resisting the urge to get up and look at him more closely, “but sweet mother of Chebyshev, you’re doing that every time we game from now on.” If he’d let her, she’d already be pulling him down to her height to smother his face in kisses. The thought made her blush almost as red as Leviathan and she tried to stuff it away, into the back of her mind for another day.

"ROFLCOPTER. Now I know you’re pranking me. Good try, Normie," he said, his shoulders relaxing until he noticed how unwavering her focus was. "H-Hey, stop staring at the worthless otaku."

“No one said you were worthless” she said, a mutter loud enough for him to easily hear. With a huff at her fantasy being far from attainable, she burrowed back down into Asmodeus’ pillow fortress. The last thing heard before dropping off once more was Asmodeus attempting to shoo Leviathan’s tail away from his pant leg again.

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**12:30**

**AsmoBaby:** Not even halfway done with my work and she’s already blushing and tucking her hair behind her ear. 

**AsmoBaby:** I. AM. MASTERFUL!

 **Not Today, Satan:** But have you fed the human?

* * *

When she next woke, it was to a glass of water being nudged in her direction between columns of frilly pillows. Dark blue nail polish was inches from her nose by the time she recognized the invader. “Leviathan, let me sleep,” she snapped. She wanted to kick her feet childishly. What she wouldn’t give for a nap in a warm, sunny space, devoid of pesky demons and poisonous things.

“Can’t, it’s past lunch time. Asmo went to go get food.” He sounded far too reasonable.

Shedding off the blanket that had been placed over her at some point, she sat up and blinked owlishly. At least Asmodeus had turned off the vanity lighting. 

"What do you think you're doing? Don't try to get up so fast," he said, watching her sway. The tip of his tail prodded her shoulder, halting her rapid pitch forward and saving the water.

“What on Earth...” she said, staring and taking in the contrast between the crisp lines of his dark pants and white button up, and the relaxed way they fell over his frame. The suspenders were very tempting.

“Is it that bad?” he asked as she dismounted from her hoard of pillows. He fidgeted with one of the rolled up sleeves. His focus was on the tile under her feet.

“No, you look excellent,” she said, and resisted the urge to snap his dark suspenders over the opened, white shirt. “It’s even better than the outfit we picked out for your trip to the Sucre Frenzy concert.” Maybe she’d snap them later when he was less self-conscious, _if_ he got less self-conscious. 

“You don’t have to lie. I know I’m an ugly, good for nothing, icky otaku.” His shoulders were beginning to sag and curl inward.

“I'm pregnant,” she said quickly before he could finish saying otaku. Her delivery was absolutely dead pan, and she didn’t halt her ogling. 

“WHAAAAAT?” He looked like he couldn’t figure out which direction to run in, his eyes alternating between flicking up and down her body, and away again to every wall, before settling on the ceiling.

“I thought we were stating things that were impossible,” she said, laughing as she felt Leviathan’s tail curl around her ankle again, likely without his conscious approval.

“Why would you do that?” he asked, clutching his hand over his heart.

Did he realize he flexed his tail with each exhale when he hyperventilated?

“Quit being such a tadpole.” She took a drink of her water. At least he wasn’t freaking out about his appearance anymore. Her eyes trailed over the black pants and up to his undershirt, noting the hint of navy blue in them both. They suited him: not so snug as to be constricting, but not so loose as to hide his slim build. A fine improvement over his long sweater. Maybe he’d let her steal it now. 

A smile tugged at her lips and she obscured it with her glass. He was stepping outside his comfort zone, even without her walking him through it. If she wasn’t careful with her glee, he’d scurry away, so she kept it to herself.

“Whatever, Normie,” he said, crossing his arms petulantly as she began to walk around him and check him out from different angles.

“Says the nerd.” 

“Riajuu,” he shot back, letting his tail track with her as she circled.

She withheld the urge to give a low whistle and grinned instead. “Dweeb.” It was nice to see playful, stubborn Levi after the clusterfuck of emotions this week.

“Dilettante” 

“ _Mine_.”

“Aaagh.” He’d managed to keep his composure until that point, but now he was crouching low and hiding his face in his knees. "You can’t just say things like that!”

“Why not?”

“You’re just saying things to shock me so I make an even bigger fool of myself.”

“And here I was going to offer you a totally legit high-five for surviving your first magical girl transformation,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady when he squeezed her ankle tight enough to bruise.

“AH! I was kidding! WAIT! There’s no taking back high-fives!”

Smiling, she stood in front of him until he brought his hands away from his face. “The Lord of Shadows couldn’t have done any better,” she said, and offered her palm to him. It was the only way she could think to convey how brave she thought he was that would be welcome. It was also ridiculously cute how he basked in the moment their hands met.

She attempted to drag her eyes away; the combination of hot and cute was doing tingly things to her stomach, and she’d had far too much of that lately. Thankfully, afterwards, Leviathan seemed just as intent on ignoring her in favour of hiding his hand behind his back. If she didn’t know how often he swam, she’d suspect he was considering never washing it again. 

“Here comes Asmo-chan!” she heard as the bedroom door was nudged open gracefully by Asmodeus’ hip. 

“My, oh my. On his knees again already, Dearest. You work fast!” His hands were full with two trays but he still shimmied his shoulders at her with a suggestive gaze.

“Asmo...” she said with a roll of her eyes. She accepted his kiss to her cheek before she was ushered to a stool and handed a plate. “I expect my pajamas back by the time I go to bed tonight.” 

“Ugh. Asmo. _Try_ to keep your lips off the human?”

“Now, now, just because I keep my hands to myself outside my door doesn’t mean the same rules apply in _my_ room,” he said, playfully caressing her under the chin with a single finger.“Besides, she doesn't mind.”

She didn’t shy away from his affection, instead leaning into the fleeting sensation. “As much of a wonderful pervert as he is,” she said, around her sandwich, “Asmo is very good about my boundaries, but we’ll try to keep the canoodling to a minimum today.”

Asmodeus huffed and set down the other tray, whipping out his D.D.D., steadfastly ignoring the both of them for the moment.

She hadn’t honestly expected Leviathan to put up with Asmodeus’ fussing for more than a few minutes. Waking up to command them to nap with her had looked like her ideal outcome. It had been a pleasant surprise, even if she had wanted more time to sleep. Maybe six months was enough time to practice not picking on one another.

Now she just had to keep herself even keel and tuck away her groggy crankiness for a few more hours. Lucifer would be back soon and then _he_ could keep them from destroying a portion of the house, and if he thought she wasn’t going to snooze for the rest of the day then he’d have another thing coming. 

If exhaustion were an Olympic sport in this household, she’d be in the running for a silver medal at the very least. She slouched back only to jerk forward the moment her back started to touch the wall and the cuts began to sting again. Hopefully, they could maintain their truce until reinforcements arrived; she wasn’t sure she had the energy for an entire day of adapting to their craziness and whims.

* * *

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**13:30**

**AsmoBaby:** Try not to be such a cock block, Levi.

 **AsmoBaby:** Remember the mantra!

 **NotTodaySatan:** Teamwork makes the dream work?

 **L3VI:** …Close enough.

* * *

“Mmm. This is really good,” she said around bites of her sandwich. “Thanks, Asmo.”

“Wait, did you cut this one in the shape of Azuki-tan?” Leviathan asked, grinning happily at his sandwich and holding it up in both hands as if to show it off.

“Maaaybe.” Asmodeus took a seat next to their human. He patted his lap and looked at her expectantly.

Glancing between her two demons, she swallowed her bite of sandwich. “Um.”

“Do you want to be comfortable and yourself, or do you want to show Levi how uptight you can be?” Asmodeus asked, looking at Leviathan instead of her.

Reaching for her water, she took her time drinking. Asmo wasn’t directly taunting Leviathan like he did with Mammon, but he was clearly trying to pressure her. She knew she shouldn't push Leviathan any further today, but his eyes were glued to his D.D.D. and his tail wasn’t twitching yet. She set down her glass.

“You might as well,” Leviathan said. “You’ll need to get up for me to look at your back again anyway, and I can’t have you falling over. Asmo can hold you up.”

Asmodeus stood and scooped her up despite her concerned expression. When he sat back in his chair, it was no different from their normal cuddling, with her straddling him, but she’d made up her mind. “I’ll sit here, and feed you my sandwich, but you’re not getting any lovey-doviness after trying to pressure me in front of Levi,” she said, poking out just the tip of her tongue at him. 

“How did you manage to get all the moisture out of this?” Leviathan asked, peeling up the edge of the dressing on her back. “Are you made of salt?” His question sounded sincere.

“Ha! Oh, with some of the things that come out of her mouth, you’d think she was,” Asmodeus said before she smooshed the sandwich into his mouth.

“Running for your life is very dehydrating for humans,” she said with a hefty helping of sass. She closed her eyes and silently cringed. It wasn’t Leviathan’s fault she felt like a rung out wash rag. “Sorry, Levi.” She knew he couldn’t see her expression, but her crankiness was ebbing away to be replaced with regret. “Can you make it better again?”

“Dearest One, _I_ can make it _allll_ better,” Asmodeus said, purring the words against her ear, and shifting his position under her so that her knees slid further behind him. 

“Asmo!” Her reprimanding stare wouldn’t be enough, she knew; she’d already let him pull her closer without showing actual discomfort. If she didn’t shut him down completely soon, he’d continue to see how far he could push her. He just had to choose to test her when she was this tired. 

“ _Gross_ ,” Leviathan said. “I can fix it if you can keep him from suctioning himself to you. 

She blushed at the description, and made to turn and apologize for the impossible flirt under her. Whipping back around to face Asmodeus, she took another bite of her sandwich without saying a peep. She’d forgotten Leviathan looked stupidly hot right now.

“I just need to add something to this first and it takes a minute to spin and grind down,” Leviathan explained, as if that meant anything to her. He’d magicked algal dressings for her wounds out of nothingness last time, what was one more thing she didn’t know about? 

“You’re even redder now than before,” Asmodeus said, poking at one of her chipmunk cheeks. “Should I take that as a compliment to my skill?”

“Excellent sandwich,” she said, mumbling around the bread with a nod.

“You,” he said, tapping her nose, “are a terrible liar.” 

“Fine,” she said, swallowing the dry bread, too tired for his games. “Levi’s hot. He was hot before, but now everyone can see it. You’ve ruined the secret hotness.” Squeezing her eyes shut, she waited to hear the sound of Leviathan keeling over. When it didn’t come, she cautiously opened one eye. Why hadn’t there been a reaction? Had Asmodeus coaxed her into answering questions in her sleep again? Maybe Leviathan had already heard her admit something similar?

With yelp, she fell forward onto Asmodeus and he laughed at her reaction. 

“Ah! Cold!” she said trying to wiggle away from Leviathan’s hand between her shoulder blades.

“You’re supposed to thank me," Leviathan said, his voice a strange mixture of annoyed and pleased as he trapped her between them.

She opened her mouth to complain again, but Asmodeus pulled her into a kiss. The angle was uncomfortable, but he was pouring the heat of his magic into her mouth, and she shivered between the warring temperatures, goosebumps rushing to cover her arms and legs.

Still pinned in place, she tilted her face away to breathe, inhaling sharply when the sensation of cold at her back grew stronger and dipped beneath the back of her clothing. Her lips still tingled. 

“Well, maybe leaving my room once in a while isn’t the worst thing,” Leviathan said as Asmodeus continued distracting her, this time running his tongue up the length of her neck while he held the fine hairs at her nape out of the way of Leviathan’s hands.

Shivering, she didn’t move from her perch when both of them stopped. She rested her temple against Asmodeus’ shoulder and didn’t look at either of them. “You are always so sneaky when I’m tired,” she said to Asmodeus, unable to decide whether she was pleased or upset. 

“It can’t be helped that you needed distracting,” Asmodeus said. He sounded so innocent, but she knew better. “Besides, it’s _always_ uncomfortable with bits of Levi’s jacket in it.”

“Excuse me?” She strained to look over her shoulder, pressing away from Asmodeus’ chest with the intensity of her concern. “What did you do? Levi!”

There was a shuffling and a mumbling behind her, but she wasn’t willing to face Leviathan just yet, still shaken from the suddenness of their synchronized attack. Every time she let her guard down, her demons found a way to toe over a line.

“Listen here, you sneaky demons—”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To see a cute image I doctored to be our spiffy Leviathan, please go to Side Quest 1: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27098809 
> 
> I found the original on Pinterest and don't know to whom it belongs. https://www.pinterest.nz/pin/232639136981415833/


	91. Negotiations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A short window of time where boundaries with Leviathan begin to be drawn while MC quickly dresses to meet with Satan.  
> 47th Day, Thursday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to Dalektable for her edits and suggestions on this.

She really would have to get Asmodeus to stop heaping fabrics and shoes upon her at every opportunity. At this point, she was fairly certain he’d created a section for her in his closet. 

Leviathan’s tail was still wrapped around her wrist, while he shuffled forward, lost in thought as he carried the latest of Asmodeus’ tribute of clothing, always a few paces ahead of her despite seemingly oblivious to her attempts to catch up to his side. 

It was clear he was distracted. The robotic way he walked was a dead give away; usually, he would be fidgeting with something in hand, or researching the newest video, plugged in with noise cancelling headphones, not sleep walking them both into his bathroom instead of her bedroom.

“Hey, I know you’re handsome and all,” she said to his back once he’d paused for long enough to begin clacking his nails against his bathroom countertop, “but I’m going to need this arm back if I’m gonna get out of my pajamas.” Her skin was already goosebumping in the cool room. “Levi?”

"Right, sorry," Leviathan said. He released her arm from the tight hold of his tail and turned quickly to walk past her.

"Wait." Pinching at the white fabric of his sleeve, she wasn't sure what she wanted to say when he halted, but she didn’t want him to leave upset. "What's going through your head right now?" She wished she’d caught hold of his arm sooner so that she could get a better look at his expression, as it was he was practically side by side with her.

His tail was twitching and his voice was lower than she was used to, as if he couldn’t decide whether to speak in English or Infernal. "Did you...did you mean it?"

"Mean what?" Releasing his shirt, she tilted her head to the side to look up at him. He might run off if she stepped back to make proper eye contact; some days he was still like that. Having his outer shell changed so drastically would probably make it into one of those days.

"Do you like me like...this?" He gestured at himself with a limp hand, still not looking at her.

"I like you both before and after your magical girl transformation," she said. It was true; this was just new and exciting.

"But which do you like  _ more _ ?" he asked, finally turning to look at her.

Her gaze wavered. She hadn’t expected such a serious expression with his brows pinched and his lips in a tight line. It reminded her of Lucifer.

"I see," he said, with a growing frown.

"No, you don't," she said, her annoyance beginning to catch up with her fatigue. "This is just different so it throws me off, but you're still my guarded guppy. Now hop out so I can get changed.”

He loomed over her and she stubbornly held her ground. "What?"

Her defensive posture, with her arms crossed, was obvious, but he still leaned further into her space. "Have you always been so cuddly with Asmo?" 

There was a brief flicker of purple around them, but she didn't fall back. "Almost always," she said without hesitation. She never lied to him. He had to start remembering that. 

"When you mentioned...Ruri-chan?" he asked, as he stared, picking apart her reactions as if she were a connect-the-dots drawing he could decipher if he just looked hard enough. 

"Did I really think Ruri-chan would chase you? Absolutely. Without a doubt," she said, growing bolder as she spoke. "If any of the she-devils saw the superman you hide under your Clarke Kent, I'd have to beat them away with an enchanted stick."

Shrugging off the surge of jealousy she knew he must’ve felt, she rubbed her arms to warm them, a welcome distraction. This time it was her turn to look anywhere but at him and she cleared her throat. "That being said, I'm surprised you didn't negotiate for at least one giant bow or a mecha arm."

"There is a bow," he said, "but about boundaries and  _ negotiations _ ..."

"Uhm. Sure. Step out and we can talk while I get dressed. How's that?" Her heart beat too loudly for her comfort until he turned on his heel and left, leaving the door ajar behind him. 

Was he trying to kill her? Where was the bow? Why did she ask him ‘How’s that?’ when she could usually poke him in the side and he’d go running for the safety of his tub. She wasn't used to  _ Leviathan _ being in her personal space, or making her think of hidden things. 

"Right," she said, pulling herself back to reality. She began sorting through the small mountain of clothing for something comfortable and warm instead of pacing the room like a flustered pre-teen. "So, boundaries,” she called out, loud enough that her voice would carry. “Uh, often it's best to say what you'd like before you outline what you don't like." She slipped out of the romper without issue. "For example, I know you don't like being touched very much, but I don't know what you  _ do _ like, or would find comfortable instead, since it's normal for me."

The note cards and pen had travelled with the clothing safely, but her sweatpants were nowhere to be seen, only form fitting dresses. “Damn it, Asmo,” she muttered before being startled by Leviathan's reply.

"It's...not bad when I have a chance to get used to it," he said, haltingly. "Just, not when anyone else can see. It's still too much."

"That's great to know," she said, trying to be bright and encouraging as she unbuttoned the front of a dress with a low back. "I know you want the kind of bond that the Lord of Shadows and Henry have. What do you see that looking like for us?"

"No, it's your turn."

She fumbled with the opening of the last button. "Well, I like gaming with you and watching shows, or even reading side by side...and I like when you're comfortable enough around me to stay in your demonic form."

Stepping into the dress and beginning to rebutton it, she waited to see if Leviathan would take another turn, but he stayed silent. "What's something you want to do that you're worried I'll judge you for?" she asked, aiming for the meat of his fears.

A strangled noise came from the other side of the door.

"For example, you didn't think I'd like accompanying you to the Magical Ruri Hana: Demon Girl art exhibition, and we only got to go together because Lucifer required me to chaperone you."

She heard what sounded like coughing.

"I-I would like to use your lap as a pillow like that one time I passed out during the Mordant Pledge marathon."

“I'd like that," she said without missing a beat. "Do any of your eroge games come with a voyeur mode?"

" _ What? _ " The way he said it made it clear he was speaking more than one note at once again, neither were pleasant pitches.

"So I that I can watch you play," she said matter-of-factly, as if she'd just asked to watch him play Uno.

There was a growl that cut off before she had time to decipher it. 

"It's okay if that's a no go for you," she said. "That's the point of us talking about it, remember?" Might as well ask for the maximum first and make everything else after look more reasonable.

There was no answer from him, even as she finished fastening the last button. Somehow, the Devildom fabric was warm and cozy despite its lack of sleeves and back. She tested the stretch of the material. It would be easy to run in if need be. 

The pitter patter of tiny webbed feet could be heard approaching, and the door creaked open to reveal a Little Demon with a tablet in both its hands.

She raised her eyebrows in surprise but collected the device with thanks, before reading the words already on the screen.

_ I will think about it. _

That wasn't a no. She leaned against the counter, over the mound of clothing. "Tell me something else you want to do, and something that's a no go for you?" she asked loudly, assuming it would need to carry to his computer desk.

_ ‘Tap tap tap.’ _ She could hear him typing, and mass deleting, even with the door between them.

_ Couple's cosplay? _

"Oooh that would be fun! You beat me to it, that was my next suggestion...I was worried you'd think I was being weird or presumptuous or something. What's a hard no for you?"

_ No ‘Absolute Territory’ if I have to be out with you in public. _

"Leviathan!" she said, feigning being scandalized. "Does that mean you want me to wear miniskirts and thigh highs at home?" She heard the mashing of keys and the telltale squeak of his computer chair as he leaned away from his desk. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. That wasn't nice of me."

_ It's fine. _

She paused. "Do you mean that, or do you just mean you accept my apology?"

_ Both. _

"So you don't mind my flirtiness all the time?"

_ It's hard not to get overwhelmed, or overthink, but yeah. It's nice sometimes. _

She didn't know what to say to that. Trying to not to razz him like that was something she was used to working hard at; it was going to be difficult not to overwhelm him while she figured out where his line had migrated. 

_ How much contact is too much for you? When you were awake, and Asmo was with you, you were never not touching. _

Looking at the time, she sighed and stuffed her note cards into her dress pocket before poking her head out of the door and into his room. "It depends on how my day is going," she said, startling him. "Let's walk and talk before we're late."

He followed her to the door, his hands in his pockets, and his shirt slightly more unbuttoned than she remembered.

"Do you actually like it when I pet your head, or are you just too overwhelmed to tell me to stop?" she asked.

“I—” 

She waited, knowing better than to turn and look at him.

“I like it. I want…”

“You’ll have to speak up. It’s hard to hear you from behind me.”

“I want you to be my friend forever.”

She slowed her pace and he matched it to stay out of her sight.

“Levi, you’re going to outlive me by thousands and thousands of years. I can’t promise I’ll be your friend forever…”

There was silence while they made their way to the stairwell at a snail’s pace.

“I can’t promise forever,” she said when they reached the first landing, “but I promise you that every moment I’m alive we’ll still be best friends.”

“I’ll just have to figure out how to keep you alive then,” he said with a surety that surprised her.

Smiling, she shook her head. “Bold of you to assume I’ll survive this week.” She changed topics quickly to keep from thinking about it. "So, do you mind when I lick you?"

"N-no," he said, now as close as her shadow while they walked the main floor to the common room. "Same question."

"Well, no. I like it, but only if it's not making your brothers jealous,” she said, “and you can't claim ignorance on that one! You're the avatar of it, so no pretending you don't notice." Her arms swung at her sides freely without the constant pinch of pain from her back. "What kind of present do you expect for your birthday?" she asked quickly.

"I want you to go with me to Ruri-land for their grand opening. Tickets go on sale next week." 

It seemed as though it was getting easier for him to say things the longer they talked, but they were already closing in on the common room.

"Same question," he said again.

Her hand on the door knob, she stopped to look back at him. His hair was messy, and he looked the perfect amount of dishevelled, as if she’d just finished running her hands all over him. "I want to see you in your full dress regalia, in person,” she said, pausing to meet his eyes, “or in Ruri-chan’s maid outfit.” She opened the door and walked through, leaving him floundering for words.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look forward to the unexpected soon <3


	92. The Second Official RHC Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC is meant to have some reading time with Satan wherein he hopes to plumb her feelings about how he accidentally turned her hands into explosive pads for an evening, resulting in the death of three demons.
> 
> Unfortunately, Leviathan having revealed some concerning magical news, an RHC meeting must first be held. After all, Satan needs to go into his conversation with her armed with as much knowledge as possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone! Thanks once again for tuning in and as always, a massive thank you to Dalektable for reading through this to help me iron it out.
> 
> If there is anyone who would be interested in joining as a beta-reader, I'd love to hear from you. I'm just putting out too much content for one human to sift through! 
> 
> I have created a little channel on discord for any beta readers who might be interested in working with us, and if not, you're also welcome to join the general forum or the pet-peeves area where we gripe about things we dislike reading in fics. https://discord.gg/m5CYu2xX5k

**The Official Reverse Harem Club Chat (3):**

**47th Day, Thursday**

**14:02**

**L3VI:** I

**L3VI:** I can’t

**L3VI:** help

**L3VI:** HELP!

**AsmoBaby:** You’ve been out of my sight for ten minutes!

**AsmoBaby:** I’m on my way. Don’t die on us! Satan, run interference for the poor, shy blenny.

**L3VI:** ARE WE SURE SHE’S NOT A DEMON??!?!

**L3VI: *Blue Lightning Demoji***

* * *

“You're late. I was about to go out looking for you,” Satan said, setting his D.D.D. down on the common room table. “I was beginning to think Leviathan had gotten trapped again.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “You’re very funny.”

“Some people think so,” he said before taking a seat at the table behind the couch. “Unfortunately, I need to borrow Levi for some Devilnet questions, do you mind if he and I go over them together before we dive into our literature?”

Reaching toward the back of the couch, she stumbled forward; where her hand would usually land on the back of the couch, it missed. She looked down, obviously concerned at her lapse in judgement. “What happened to the couch legs?” she asked, crouching down to inspect the collapsed furniture.

“Never mind that, Dearest,” Asmodeus said, walking through the doors at the opposite end of the room. “I was still a little hotblooded last night. Very inexpensive collateral.”

Not for the first time she found herself wondering just how much their titles earned them that couches were a dime a dozen; Mammon had never been a good example to base her estimations off. She shrugged and didn’t bother to ask, choosing instead to sit on the other couch with her back to the round table. Her book was already there anyway.

“Hey, Normie, catch,” Leviathan said, tossing a wireless headset to her.

“Why do I need this?”

“Demons only meeting,” he said, still having trouble looking at her.

“You realize invoking that grants me ‘No Demons Allowed’ time, right?”

Asmodeus clicked his tongue in distaste.

“Yup,” Leviathan said, staring intently at his fingernail polish. 

“I’ll join you shortly,” Satan said, his polite smile doing nothing to placate her dislike of their secrets. “In fact, I have some questions I want to ask you as well.”

"Good," she said and put the headset on. "I have  **a lot** of questions for you." Her steady gaze seemed to throw him off, enough to have him looking between his brothers rather than at her. Did he think she'd just forget that someone exploded under her hands?

She put the headphones over her ears and turned to her book, stubbornly keeping her eyes open. Given how much potion she’d absorbed, Satan was surprised she was awake at all. Tomorrow, he’d have to make an effort to discuss with her the potential ramifications of excessive potion usage.

The three lords, now all seated, quietly spoke of the Devilnet and media concerns, sticking to their cover story until they were certain she wasn’t listening.

“Alright, she’s nodded off,” Leviathan said, gesturing with this tail while he held his D.D.D.. He kept it in front of his face, the way he often did when anxious, as if it were a shield against interaction, likely a focal point from which to regroup when overwhelmed. If Leviathan was already resorting to that in the quiet of the common room then she must've been more of a handful this morning than Satan had anticipated.

“What are we discussing first?” Asmodeus asked. “Her wonky magic backlash or Levi’s magical incontinence?”

Leviathan’s eyes shot to Asmodeus, livid, before they flickered away toward the human, full of dread. “It’s not incontinence!” Leviathan hissed quietly, turning his attention back to Asmodeus when she didn’t stir. “There’s nothing wrong with my magic!”

“Be that as it may, there’s still something unusual going on with hers,” Satan said. He set his elbows on the table to help him stabilize the foundation of a weak muffling spell he was weaving. It would need to be subtle in its application; he didn’t know where her limits were anymore and didn’t want to risk it being noticed. Something this delicate wouldn’t be noticed by anyone other than himself, Lucifer, and perhaps Solomon; both were always excessively vigilant about it. It made them terribly difficult to prank or hex. “When she came here, she had no magic, but she’s borrowed magic from both Solomon and me. It’s clear she has the capacity to wield it, but I’m not certain as to how she uses it. The carcasses she left at The Fall all died differently.” 

"Hmm, when she summoned me to deal with Levi's snake, she pulled out far more of my power than Solomon ever has," Asmodeus said, watching as Satan passed bits of magic through his hands once more, stringing the shimmering net together like child’s game of cat's cradle.

While Satan prepared to release the spell into the corners of the room, he rocked his glowing hands gently from side to side, explaining when he saw Asmodeus’ concerned look, “Just a weak muffling spell; it would ruin your plans if she knocked off the headphones in her sleep, or if she tries to eavesdrop." 

“You say that as if you aren’t a part of the club already,” Leviathan said. His words were whispered, but his disbelief carried easily through the room.

Satan wouldn't dignify that with a response, instead focusing on releasing the threads quietly into the air and guiding the webbing to stick discreetly around the couch on which their human slumbered. “More importantly than _ that _ , we need to figure out how to reduce the frequency of her injuries; her physical trauma far outweighs the spiritual at this point.” He watched her stir and frown in her sleep and it tugged at something uncomfortable in his chest. A mystery for later.

The gentle spell was nearly stabilized, so featherlight that it could be torn apart by a breeze, and Satan rested his hands on the table, content that it would fall into place without further guidance.

“Where’s she going?” Asmodeus asked, having looked unconcerned at their human’s subtle stirrings until he watched bolt, vaulting over the broken couch without pause.

Leviathan was already standing to follow her, walking quickly away from his brothers. 

The muffling spell dropped away into whisps, and Satan motioned for them all to follow her. He was impressed that she’d managed to snatch Rancor out of the air. She couldn’t have noticed it, could she? She hadn't even stirred when the cat left her lap.

Her steps sounded loudly on the floor overhead and they made for the stairs as well.

“Hey! Normie! Get back here. I’m supposed to be watching you!”

Then silence was all that met their calls and panic began to set in. 

“Split up. We’ll cover more ground that way,” Leviathan said. He was already making for the wing that neighboured his room when he shouted back for Asmodeus to take the East wing.

Satan tried to calm his frustration. How could he not find an often obnoxiously loud human in his own home? She was the worst when it came to stealth, always knocking things over or stepping on the squeakiest stair. 

Half an hour had passed by the time the three of them reconvened in the entry hall and Satan patted Leviathan’s back, seeing his bent frame, hands on knees, panting. Running was not his strong suit, and his search route had had the most stairwells.

“We’ll have to ask the Little Demons,” Satan said. Left hand to his chest, he tapped his index finger against his collarbone as he reached out to their minions, flooding the air with a vibration that would be too deep for her to feel. It rolled slowly, too slowly to cause the creaking floor to buckle under the waves, but a loud broadcast for anything listening for the low frequency. “We’re clearly missing her somehow, but they know every crevice of this building.” 

Responding to the silent call that had run down into the floor through Satan’s feet, the sound of the Little Demons’ high pitched growls and hisses filled the air with a faint static. The menacing  _ snick-snack  _ of claw-tipped fingers echoed over the walls, the patter of little feet giving away their positions. 

Slowly, their servants gathered before them.

Would it be wise to sick them on her after all? She  _ had _ learned to understand a bit of Infernal speech, but would it be enough for her not to flee from the waves of Little Demons that would be coming for her? The representatives that had gathered at their feet would inform the rest of the garrison and she would be overrun before long.

The pit of his stomach felt cold. He was out of patience, and a strange combination of guilt and confusion was gnawing at him. 

“The human is missing,” Satan said sharply. The transfixed motes of shadow rabbled and he realized he needed to be more mindful of how much power he was allowing to leak into his words. Words made reality, and he would temper his speech to keep from imbuing too much zeal into their search and accidentally injure her. “Find her, then take us to her. If she is in need of aid, protect her and tend to her until we arrive.” 

They dispersed without waiting to be formally dismissed, relying on the disappearance of power in the air as their signal to slide into the seams of floors and walls, and into cracks hidden by portraits.

“You don’t actually think she’s in danger, do you?” Leviathan asked. His hands were balled into fists at his sides. It was clear he was trying not to cry with the way his face was reddened and scrunched. 

“No, I trust in the wards we’ve placed,” Satan said with certainty, “but it’s unnatural that we can’t find her.” It made him wonder if she had a magic he was unaware of. Had her time here, steeped in magic, allowed her own magic to grow and unfold inside her? It was possible she’d found a way to slip unseen, unbeknownst even to herself. He swallowed thickly. They needed to find her quickly. Untrained magic was as dangerous to the user as anything they could do to those around them. He thought of the scale demon remains he'd examined and a heat lanced out from his stomach and into his limbs, urging him to continue searching as well.

Asmodeus paced, his thumbs twitching against his other fingers, unintentionally sharpening his nails on one another. The glow around his digits only faded when the first trickle of scouts returned.

Jubilantly, they bounced up and down, tugging at pant legs, and squawking about the room of the twins.

It didn’t take long for all of them to enter the bedroom. The door was still ajar, but everything else was in its place. Pristine. 

“There’s nothing here,” Asmodeus said with an exasperation that was beginning to sound frantic. He was checking under the beds when a Little Demon hooked a claw inside the bare, diamond pattern of his pant leg and tugged at him. He shook it off and flew up to search the mezzanine. 

Even without a word from Asmodeus, the irregular flutter of his wings coming from the level above them told Satan she wasn't there.

Over and over, the Little Demons brought them back to Belphegor’s wardrobe. After searching behind it, under it, and pushing clothing aside inside it, the little creatures still insisted she was there, where there was nothing but clothing and wood. 

Satan was close to splintering the armoire into a thousand pieces. His detective skills had failed them. He paced, trying to put away the impotent rage that was rattling against his usually placid shell. 

Carefully, he tried, for what felt like the hundredth time, to reach out to their weak bond. Even if he was wrong and she didn’t have any magic of her own to strengthen the pact, maybe his magic alone would be enough to trace the tether. Why had he never tried before today? They could have practiced together.

His heart clenched when he still felt nothing. It must have shown. 

“We need to make the call,” Asmodeus said, his words hollow as he sat heavily on Belphegor’s bed, his head dropping low to cradle it in his hands.

Leviathan looked at them both, took in their grim expressions, and dialed. 


	93. Lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 47th Day, Thursday
> 
> The demons attempt to retrieve their lost human.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thank you to Dalektable for beta reading this.

She caught Rancor midair, spinning to maintain the pantheptera’s inertia and hide the blush from her request, leaving Leviathan behind her to flounder.

Asking for a kiss for her birthday had been at the top of her list, but after the morning they'd had, she knew Leviathan was at his limit for today, possibly for the month; pushing him further would’ve only ended in him retreating.

“You're late. I was about to go out looking for you,” Satan said, setting his D.D.D. down on the common room table. “I was beginning to think Leviathan had gotten trapped again.”

“You’re very funny,” she said, and rolled her eyes at him. He’d never before been concerned about seeking her out when she was late; he’d rather seethe about it, and she couldn’t tell if he was serious now or teasing her. Something in his eyes made her think he meant it. Maybe her death rattle had shaken him.

“Some people think so,” he said before taking a seat at the table behind the couch. “Unfortunately, I need to borrow Levi for some Devilnet questions, do you mind if he and I go over them together before we dive into our literature?”

Reaching toward the back of the couch, she stumbled forward; where her hand would usually land on the back of the couch, it missed. “What happened to the couch legs?” she asked, crouching down to inspect the collapsed furniture.

“Never mind that, Dearest,” Asmodeus said, walking through the doors at the opposite end of the room. “I was still a little hotblooded last night. Very inexpensive collateral.”

Ignoring her lapse in spatial awareness, she assessed her demons as she sat on the opposite couch, accepting the headset tossed to her, and the demons only imperative. They were clearly scheming something if they wanted alone time. No matter, she’d pry it out of one of them later. By then, they’d be bursting at the seams to tell her. Her confused and hurt expression was usually enough to have Asmodeus and Leviathan falling over themselves to confess anything that would concern her.

“I’ll join you shortly,” Satan said, his polite smile doing nothing to placate her dislike of their secrets. “In fact, I have some questions I want to ask you as well.”

"Good," she said, as Rancor glided down onto the couch next to her with an audible ‘ _bumf_ ’. She set Leviathan’s headphones over her ears, ready to enjoy the room silencing device and Rancor’s company. "I have a lot of questions for you." Her steady gaze seemed to throw him off, enough to have him looking between his brothers rather than at her. Did he think she'd just forget that someone exploded under her hands?

The ambient music muffled Satan’s reply. Cracking her book open stubbornly, intent on being awake for at least some of the day despite the way Leviathan's music was already lulling her back to sleep, she shivered away the phantom feeling of bone shards embedded once more in her skin. She knew the feeling would pass like everything else before it had.

The warmth of the fire and Rancor’s purring in her lap melted her defenses and slackened her limbs far too soon. She knew her demons were with her, and the heaviness of sleep was so very welcoming. Her book could wait, at least until Satan was ready to read too. Sleeping just a little longer wouldn’t be so bad. There was no reason to be stubborn. She was safe. Satan would wake her soon enough and she stopped fighting the battle against her drooping eyelids.

So why was her heart racing? She gasped desperately for air, up and moving before she was fully awake. ‘Run! Run! Run! There’s danger!’ her mind screamed, forcing her legs to move.

She didn’t realize she was out the common room door until she was halfway up the stairs. Book abandoned, pantheptera clutched to her chest, she ran blindly past walls of portraits and balconies covered in vines, not stopping until she’d found a place of relative safety.

“What the fuck?” She asked, chanting the question again and again after she collapsed to the polished wooden floor. The dustless planks under her cheek were cool. “What the fuck was that?”

Rancor growled at the tight arms around her, and struggled loose to flap about the bright room.

Eventually, her breathing slowed. The dizziness of hyperventilation mostly gone, she finally pushed herself up shakily, and pulled her D.D.D. from her pocket. No power. There never was here, but just this once she’d been tempted to call someone for comfort.

Rancor had already finished her investigation of the room’s perimeter and was pawing at the green wall through which they’d tumbled. It was amazing that the pantheptera could so readily determine the entrance despite it lacking a real door.

“This is all your fault,” she said, muttering to the room and stuffing the D.D.D. away.

She still had no idea why she’d run, only that the instinct had overridden everything, even sleep. It made no sense. Why? And why would Lilith’s room be any safer? Her eyes watered. “Is this what you wanted?” she asked, shouting her words to the decorative, recessed ceiling.

The sound of chimes whispered through the room, fluttering the hair next to her ear.

“Is this what you planned? For me to be constantly in fear?” She stood up and swatted at the air near her face, hoping it would at least be a discomfort to Lilith’s ghost.

“No! You don’t get to play the victim! This was your plan. It’s your fault. So, is this what you wanted? To watch me tear myself apart?”

Snippets of sadness and regret sighed through the room, swaying the sheer curtains.

“You never should have opened the window in Lucifer’s study!" she shouted before standing and walking to Rancor, who’d fled to the mantle, spitting and hissing atop it. “You had no right.” Her words were throttled with the strength of emotion behind them.

Lilith usually only bothered her in her sleep. Why did she have to be here now?

Carefully, she petted Rancor into a level of moderate calm, something she knew that she wouldn’t be able to get herself to feel any time soon. Rancor’s wings never closed completely, but it was something to focus on. Maybe Lilith would get bored and go away to do whatever it was ghosts did when they weren’t fucking with the living.

The coverings over the furniture stirred and she felt words, like warm rain, pleading and praising.

“Your pretty words are worthless,” she said, turning away. “I see where Belphegor learned to mislead without uttering falsehoods.”

There was a tinkling of bells.

“That wasn’t a compliment, you selfish bitch!” Did Lilith think she would just magically be forgiven? That she would keep listening to her suggestions just because of who she was or how they were related?

This time broken English words sounded around her. “I...because you’re my…”

“Don’t give me that stuttering bullshit!” she said to the empty room, the only replying sound the shifting of Rancor’s leathery wings. “You're the only one I actually belong to, but you don't love me at all...” She hated how her vocal chords squeaked when she said it, how it strained and cut off, exposing how much the betrayal actually hurt.

Stepping away from the mantle, she sat down heavily in a cloth covered armchair, ignoring her progenitor while she tried to calm down, and only occasionally swatting at the air when the current changed too close to her.

There was a coal of anger in her that never seemed to fully go out no matter how tired or empty she felt, and it was Lilith’s fault. “You sent me to my death,” she said finally, staring at the backlit windows that looked out into nowhere. “You knew!” Bile rose up in her throat, and she was tempted to spit it out across the too perfect carpet under her feet.

“Dropping me into this den of wolves was bad enough, almost forgivable, but you opened that door through me,” she said, spreading her hand across her chest for emphasis, “and you left me to die!” Looking around the room, she couldn’t see any movement or answer to her pain. “You knew what Belphegor was when you did it.” Each word was too tight in her throat and ended in a whisper. “Don’t pretend you didn’t know...I can hear it.”

Drawing her knees up and folding her elbows over their peaks, she rested her head between them. “Just go away. I don’t want your memories in my dreams. Stop coming back. I’ve fulfilled my purpose, now fuck off.” She felt the hair on the back of her neck rise again and willed herself to remain still and ignore the loving words that flowed over her skin.

Forgiveness? Impossible. How did she expect to be forgiven after months of manipulation, death, and dream-stealing? It was too much. “If you can kill your grandchildren and open doors and windows,” she said, lifting her head, “you can sure as fuck figure out directions back to heaven on your own!” She surged to her feet. “Leave me alone! I’m not your puppet any more!”

The gentle whisper of rustling tall grass was indecipherable to her as it faded into nothing.

Pulling back the dust cover, she crawled beneath it, letting Rancor join her in the oversized chair and clamour into her lap. She sniffled, but didn’t cry, resting instead and listening to the sound of Rancor’s reassuring ‘putt-putt' purrs.

“At least let me die my own death,” she whispered into the sheet before closing her eyes.

* * *

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU LOST MY HUMAN?” Mammon’s voice was easy to make out over Leviathan’s D.D.D. His voice echoed between the high walls and ceiling of the twins’ room.

Perhaps using the speakerphone had been a poor choice. “As Leviathan just finished saying to  _ Lucifer _ ,” Satan said, “she has hidden somewhere within the house, and we are unable to find her.”

“Please explain to me,” Lucifer said, his disdain leaking through the device, “how the slowest mortal in the three realms managed to outrun some of the Devildom’s most powerful demons.  _ You are demons, aren’t you _ ?” 

“Ah, yes. That’s helpful. Glad to see you have your priorities in order,” Satan said, glaring at the D.D.D. in Leviathan’s hand, as if cursing it might somehow affect the other side of the line.

“Start from the beginning,” Belphegor said, each word hard and sharp through the speaker.

“She fell asleep next to the common room fire. We were talking quietly at the table behind her,” Asmodeus said slowly. “She got up and vaulted the couch, practically jumped her own height to capture the panthaptera, and then ran like the wind out the door and up the stairs.”

There was a short silence on the other end of the line. 

“Is there anything you could have said that would have made her run?” Lucifer asked. “It could help to determine where she may have run.”

“The Little Demons are adamant that she’s in an empty wardrobe,” Leviathan said. He sounded like he was ready to throw the D.D.D. the way he did with controllers when he was losing.

“There’s nothing she could have overheard to scare her,” Satan said, annoyance creeping back into his voice. “I’m not so stupid as to forget to put up a muffling spell.”

“YOU WHAT?” 

The three of them leaned away from the D.D.D. at Mammon’s outburst.

“SATAN, YOU  _ IDIOT _ ! She was trapped in a soundproofed room while they tortured her at The Fall!”

There was silence on both ends of the phone, until Belphegor spoke. “There was nothing about that in the reports. Nothing beyond evading recapture and escaping.”

“Well,  _ some  _ of us stayed up to read her report.” 

There was a muffled sound of fumbling and competing voices on the other end of the line. Surely they weren’t actually fighting right now? What was Lucifer even doing that he was letting them bicker during this emergency?

“Where are you?” Beelzebub asked, the echo of the speakerphone suddenly gone. 

“We’re in your room,” Leviathan said, his eyebrows now raised in surprise and confusion at Asmodeus and Satan.

“Uh huh, and what did the Little D’s say?”

“They say she’s in Belphegor’s wardrobe, but there’s nothing in here but clothes, nothing behind it, and nothing under it.”

“Open the wardrobe again. It’s a pocket dimension. The password is Lilith. She likes to hide in there sometimes when she’s overwhelmed. I’ll be home shortly.” 

The line went dead. 

“Well, that was unexpected,” Satan said, staring at the darkened screen of the D.D.D.

“Who’s going in?” Leviathan asked, watching Little Lust Demons use one another as a ladder, climbing higher while pushing Belphegor’s clothing out of the way. They tumbled and fell, and more Little Demons joined to shore up the growing pyramid, wispy tails now used as anchors.

Finally high enough, a black, clawed hand covered the inscription that was faintly scratched into the wood. A pitchy shriek of Infernal noise, and they all tumbled into nothingness.

“That solves that,” Satan said, with a hint of regret. “Asmo, you’ll have to go in to collect your vassals. The majority of them had pink or red horns.”

Without a word to his brothers, Asmodeus stood and made his way into the newly revealed room.

* * *

Beelzebub turned off the phone and handed it back to Lucifer without looking at Mammon or his twin. “I’m going back to the house as soon as this next task is finished,” he said, ignoring the way their hands were fisted in one another’s clothing and drawing stares. He walked into the mausoleum with purpose. 

“I thought you were going to get rid of the room?” Belphegor asked Lucifer, shoving Mammon away.

Lucifer pinched the bridge of his nose with his index finger and thumb.

“I’m going back,” Mammon said, but was halted before he could finish stepping away.

Catching them both by their collars, Lucifer began guiding them towards the mausoleum. “The two of you are not going anywhere. You have duties to uphold and Beelzebub will be more than enough to deal with the issue if your other three brothers cannot handle her.” 


	94. Asmodeus to the Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leviathan, Satan, and Asmodeus have been frantically trying to find their human mistress after she bolted from the common room. Once they'd received an earful from Mammon and directions from Beelzebub, Asmo is selected to enter the pocket dimension since it was his Little Demons that entered ahead of everyone else.
> 
> 47th Day, Thursday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A thank you to Dalektable for her hard work beta reading of this fiction. Dalektable has stepped down from her position and I am very happy to say that Elvishdork and Sarchopathic have massively stepped up to help with beta reading going forward.
> 
> Also, I've added a footnote for pronunciation and meaning of a word. Don't be afraid to click on it as I've added a return button at the bottom to bring you back up to where you were reading <3

“Are you in here, my Dearest?” Asmodeus asked, the soles of his shoes clipping on the hardwood before moving silently over the thick rug.

“No,” she croaked from her armchair.

“Can I come in?” he asked, stooping to collect the bottom of the dust cover that lay over her and the lumpy chair.

“Yeah, I guess.”

Asmodeus lifted the cover and pulled it over his head, shuffling forward on his knees until he could put his hands on the arm rests.

Slowly, she dropped her legs from guarding her belly. Rancor shifted with her and left the comfort of her compressed lap-seat to slip out into the open air.

“Hey,” she said quietly.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked softly, bringing his hands down to her knees which now rested to either side of him.

“I don’t know what happened,” she said. She closed her eyes. Her face still felt red with too much pressure and too many emotions.

“Dearest,” Asmodeus said, reaching for her, “Satan cast a muffling spell near you. It made sense for you to run. If anything, you should be proud of your growing sensitivity to magic.”

She brought her hands up to ward him off, even raising her knees to begin curling back in on herself. “No, don’t hug me,” she said. “I’ll—”

Pulling her to the edge of the chair, he held her under their little, white tent. They were bathed in the false, diffused light of the room when she began to sob against him.

* * *

Eventually, he picked her up and sat down in the chair, bringing her into his lap. “It'll be alright.”

She cried harder, and he stroked her hair. 

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you when I should have been,” he whispered against her crown, a tremor apparent in his voice. Her sobs broke pace and slowly became stuttered gasps.

“I’m sorry,” he said again. “So sorry, my Dearest One.”

“It’s not your fault,” she said through sniffles.

Her answer crushed a soft part of him. “You deserve better than this.”

She gave a laugh marred by full sinuses. “Careful, you’re starting to sound like Mammon.”

Tentatively, Asmodeus began to pull the sheet off of them, ignoring her jibe, and watching for any sign that she would oppose being exposed.

He wanted to be mindful of her back that was still healing, but he couldn’t help holding her tightly. The way the Celestial light poured over her when the sheet fell to the floor, she was beautiful. Her vulnerability here was another layer of herself she was revealing to him. Like a damask rose, one petal at a time, she kept opening herself to him, and he couldn’t look away.

“Ὡραῖος,1” he said, filled with awe. Did she know how perfect she was in this moment? If she looked up, the light of her might sear through him.

When he kissed her cheek, she closed her eyes, and the tears trapped in her lashes slid over his temporary claim.

“Should we go back?” she asked, spying the Little Demons pressing futilely against one of the green walls.

“In a minute,” he said, not yet ready to let go. Until Beelzebub had answered, he’d thought he’d lost her again. He’d failed her again; the least he could do was hold her until they were both calm.

They sat there for a time, resting in one another’s comfort. 

“Asmo?” she asked.

“Hmm?”

“Is Leviathan the only one of you able to send messages by mal'akh?”

“Would you like one of your own?” His heart warmed when his question brought wonder back to her eyes.

“Is that possible?”

“I’ll assign one to you myself.” He watched her smile form, and tucked her back under his chin. It was too bright and made his heart ache for a home that was long gone. “Have I told you lately that you have lovely legs?” His hand slid up from her knee until it reached the bunched up hem at her hip.

“Not lately,” she said with a smirk. “Why? Do you think they’d look better on your shoulders?”

“Now I know you’ll be fine,” he said before standing and setting her down on her own two feet.

She reached for the discarded sheet and blew her nose loudly into it.

“That’s disgusting!”

She did it again, only to look up and grin at him.

“Hold still,” he said, reaching into his pants to find his D.D.D. “I’m going to get a picture of your red, blotchy face for the next time I want to get my way.”

“Ha! Good luck. D.D.D.s don’t work here, and I’ve seen you hungover.”

Throwing his head back, he tossed his hair out of the way just so that she could have an unimpeded view of him rolling his eyes at her. “No one would ever believe you.”

“What? You think Lucifer is the only one I have candid shots of?” she asked, wiggling her D.D.D. at him.

“You give that here!” he said, chasing her around the room, the pantheptera flying in opposite circles overhead.

She tucked the D.D.D. back in her pocket and let him catch her in a hug. “Thanks for coming to get me,” she said.

“It wasn’t just me, Dearest. Satan and Leviathan are just outside. They even called the others for help when we couldn’t find you.” He kissed her lips without warning. It was soft, as innocent as the memories he had of this room.

When he pulled away, it was to kiss her forehead.

“What? You needed an extra one before we go?” she asked, laughing quietly.

“A forehead kiss is just a stamp that says I love you.”

She pinked, but seemed too dazed by his declaration to deflect with something sassy. Her eyes didn’t meet his any more, downcast and uncertain. “Love is a scary thing, Asmo…” Her hand fell away from his back. “It can turn people into monsters."

“It’s a good thing I’m already a monster then,” he said, and kissed her forehead again. “I have no further to fall.”

“Asmo…”

“Now, now, I’m not trying to romance you.” he said, and swayed them side to side. “If I was going to do that, I would have done it a long time ago.”

She laughed in the face of his confidence.

“Up till now, I’ve always loved myself above everyone else, but ever since you arrived, something’s been a little off…” he said, stroking her cheek. “Sometimes I find myself wanting to put _you_ first, even before me.”

“Well then,” she said. She took his face in both hands and guided him down to her height, kissing his forehead softly. “I guess I love the Avatar of Love too.”

He knew he was blushing, so he kept her close again, ensuring she couldn’t see the intensity of feeling her words created in him. Could she know how much he wanted to believe her words?

“Come,” he said, eventually taking her hand to lead her toward the exit, “they’ll be worried.”

* * *

When Asmodeus and their human stepped through the armoire, Satan and Leviathan both tried to talk at once. Yet it was Satan whose hands ghosted over her body, checking for damage in much the same way Lucifer had done once before: clinical and thorough.

He broke her hold on Asmodeus to take both of her hands in his and look them over. It was only after he was satisfied that she was whole that he pulled her into his arms and held her to him. His heart thundered in his chest and she wondered at the speed and loudness she hadn’t expected. He’d never been the most expressive about his feelings. This was something new and intense.

She held up her hands against his chest. “I’m okay,” she said. “I’m sorry I made you worry.”

“ _You’re_ sorry?” Satan asked, his mouth falling open momentarily.

She felt his left hand twitch against her back, eager to rise up to his chest in shock but halted by her frame. 

“I’m the one that destroyed your nap. If anyone should be sorry it’s us. Me.”

“Alright, then you’re all forgiven if you let me sleep,” she said, but she didn’t make any move to push him away. Instead, she let her arms slide around him loosely.

It wasn’t unusual that Leviathan hadn’t said anything else; she was used to his occasional panic induced catatonia. Asmodeus’ silence, however, was deafening. Had her flight really frightened him that much?

"H-hey, stop that," Satan said, when she tightened her arms around his middle. "That's enough with the touching. What am I going to do with you?"

She slackened her hold on him and let him turn her around. There she stood, realizing he had no idea what to do with her from there. Asmodeus and Leviathan were no better off, both staring and scrolling intently on their D.D.D.s, transfixed on anything but their own feelings. She stepped away from Satan’s warmth at her back and plodded past the other two to crawl into the nearest bed: Belphegor’s.

“Should we…” Satan began.

A tinny, yet foreboding, melody made itself known from under the blankets with her.

“Uuuuugh!” She struggled under the purple blanket to recover her D.D.D. “Hello?”

Lucifer’s deep voice answered her bitter salutation. “What part of _do not_ use your D.D.D. did you fail to understand?” 

“You’re insufferable. Go lick a toad.” She hung up and burrowed back under the covers.

There was dead silence in the room until Satan’s unmistakable laughter broke through. It started with a barely suppressed _pffft_ that quickly gained volume, escaping through his nose in an unflattering snort before bursting into the room as a full chuckle. 

“We...we should go make a call. Out in the hall,” Asmodeus said quickly, ushering Satan forcibly out of the room with him.

She allowed herself a self-satisfied smile. 

The doot-dootley-doots of a triumphant level completion melody filled the room not long after, and Leviathan answered his own D.D.D. She heard him fumble with it, gasping and cursing as it hit the floor.

“Hello?” he asked quickly. It sounded apprehensive and too high for him, but flipped to something more drained as he dragged out each word after that. “Yeah, we can order in for tonight. How late is late? No, I won’t tell her that. She’ll figure it out once she’s upside down. Mhmm. Understood.”

When he hung up, her hand sprang free of the blanket and flopped over top to garner his attention. “Levi?”

“Yeah, Normie?”

She could tell he was near the wall. “Will you keep me safe while I sleep?” Her voice sounded much smaller than she wanted it to.

“The Lord of Shadows will always protect his Henry.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   1. Ὡραῖος, hōraios, an adjective etymologically coming from the word ὥρα, hōra, meaning "hour". In Koine Greek, beauty was associated with "being of one's hour". Thus, a ripe fruit (of its time) was considered beautiful. [ ▲ ]
> 



	95. Sleepy Burrito

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 47th Day, Thursday  
> MC is done with this day. Does not care about ouchies, or secret rooms, or magic. Leviathan is now in charge of making sure she can sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Giant thank you to Elvishdork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading prowess!

There was a silence before she answered his promise. "I suspect you're all physical-ed out for the rest of the month, but you're welcome to cuddle while I sleep." Her hand retreated back under the blanket, and she drifted off; trusting Leviathan to keep his word and keep her safe.

Once Leviathan was sure she was asleep, he tucked the blanket around her to remove any chance of them touching again. She wasn't wrong; he’d gone far beyond his limit of physical contact already, but as long as he could keep her wrapped up as a sad burrito, everything would work out. That’s what he was going to keep telling himself.

Taking her back to his room, he set her to rest in his tub, checking on her every few minutes, and looking at the cracks in the rim of the tub each time with painfully red cheeks. They were going to be a constant reminder of her bare skin against his, and of the way he had accidentally exposed her body to his view.

He paced away from the tub, turning over her words, while he fiddled with the headphones she’d thrown behind her in her flight. Each thought was felt out and tumbled like the bits of the broken device in his hands: his own technological rosary. She had said she’d be his friend forever if she could. There were a number of ways he knew of but none of them were pleasant. Would she want to keep her current form? Could she even survive any of the easier options without magic?

A loud banging at his door startled him from his thoughts. “What’s the password?” he called out.

“Mammon always loses on the third lap!” a low, impatient voice called from the other side.

“Come in,” he called out, recognizing Beelzebub’s I’m-Hungry voice. Leviathan glanced down, impressed that their human was still deeply asleep despite the noise. Then again, he had promised her he’d keep her safe while she slept. Had she really taken that so to heart?

The door opened, and Beelzebub’s silhouette blocked out most of the light that would usually stream in from the hall. “Give her to me,” he demanded.

“Beel, she’s asleep.” The warm fluttering he’d begun to feel over her trust in him was quickly going cold.

“I won’t wake her up,” Beelzebub said, striding into the room with purpose.

Leviathan stepped closer to the tub. Something wasn’t right. “Albedo?”

“Barycenter,” Beelzebub said, maintaining his speed and trajectory. The flutter of his forewings was just barely visible, but the sound of them rubbing over his stunted halteres in agitation was unmistakable.

Without a second thought, Leviathan reached into the tub and scooped her up into his arms.

“You’re trying my patience, Levi.” Beelzebub said, his hand still outstretched, where it had been ready to collect her from the tub in front of him.

“You’ve got your wings out, Beel. Password or not, I’m not going to give a sleeping human to you when you’re this amped up.” Beelzebub was faster than him, but they were in his territory now, surrounded by tanks of water. This is his Henry. ‘I promised to protect her, and that means even from Beel if I have to.’

“You know better than to keep things from me,” Beelzebub said, kicking the tub out from between them. It smashed into the only wall not covered in glass and overturned. 

Leviathan transferred the blanket burrito to his tail and danced out of Beelzebub’s reach. “And you know I’m stronger than you.”

“Those rankings are ancient, and you get tired going up a flight of stairs,” Beelzebub snarled.

“Gentlemen,” Satan said from the door, coughing politely. 

Three pairs of eyes turned to look at him.

“Beel, I have a task, for which I require your help. It’s in the breaking room. Accompany me?” he asked, the order hidden in the question was plain as day.

Glancing between his tail and the door, Leviathan saw that she’d finally woken. She seemed shaken, her brows furrowed in confusion. He watched her expression soften into something close to hurt as Beelzebub slowly turned and followed Satan out the door without another word. 

When Satan shut the door quietly behind them, Leviathan finally allowed her some wiggle room and set her on her feet. "So much for that tub," he said, gazing forlornly at his busted bed.

She pushed at the coils of Leviathan’s tail and her blanket fell to the ground with it. Stumbling on uncertain legs, she used him to balance herself, quickly giving up on recovering her blanket in favour of hugging him. 

An intense heat filled Leviathan’s brain. Any minute now it was going to cook and steam would come pouring out his ears. Her hands were inside his button up, but over his undershirt. He was going to have to sleep in ice for a week.

“You make a really good Lord of Shadows,” she said. It was muffled by the way she rubbed her face against his shirt.

He closed his eyes and pretended that he  _ was _ the Lord of Shadows and ignored the way he could feel her lips against his chest even through the fabric. “Anything for my Henry,” he said, his words strained as he awkwardly patted her head. 

Uncertain of how to unwrap her, or if he should, he waited until his fear of making a mistake was finally beaten back by the intensity of her closeness. “You’re not dying, so stop hugging me. The Lord of Shadows barely holds hands when Henry is injured!”

Grudgingly, she released him, and retrieved her pilfered blanket from where it had fallen at her feet. “Yeah, well, the Lord of Shadows doesn’t sleep in an aquarium with his tiny, orange Henry either, so allowances can be made.” She stuck out her tongue at him, and then, looking to where his tub used to be, lost much of her vigour. 

She glanced down at her bare feet. “I didn’t realize Beel was still that mad at me.”

“No, that wasn’t angry,” Leviathan said, walking to his empty figurine wall. A few of the shelves had been crushed, but thankfully Lucifer hadn’t yet returned this particular collection. “Beel told us how to get to you right away, and then he hung up so he could come home. He was probably just anxious to check on you.” Leviathan nudged the tub out of the way without effort and pulled down on the top shelf of the unit, lowering it slowly to the ground.

“It’s like a transformer,” she said in quiet amazement, watching as all of the shelves pivoted while the case was moved to lay flat on its face. “Wait, you’ve had a Murphy bed this entire time? You made me sleep on the floor last month!”

“Or  _ maaaybe _ , a certain Henry has been hinting that I need one of these if I don’t want ‘snuggles.’” Re-wrapping the blanket around her, insulated from her touch once again, Leviathan walked her backward toward the wall-bed by her shoulders until the backs of her thighs bumped against the mattress’ edge. “You didn’t get to use it until now, because I had to be someone’s body pillow all morning.” His attempt at looking sour about the imposition was ruined by the way he dragged his toe on the floor awkwardly in front of him, unable to keep eye contact with her.

She gave an unflattering ‘ _ Aaghk! _ ’ when he poked her hard enough in the shoulder to tip her over onto the mattress. 

“N-now stay put until dinner,” he said, turning back to his computer. “I’m ordering from Hattusa since Lucifer said they wouldn’t be back until late, and Mammon was supposed to be on cooking duty tonight.”

“M’kay,” she said, and he heard her wiggling about, likely trying to get comfortable. “Can I have the deep-fried shadow bat with tartar sauce? If they’re out I’d like the Devildom-style vampire bat sandwich.”

She sounded pouty and cute, but he ignored her at first to sit in his gaming chair and pull up the website. “I forgot you and Beel went there for the opening,” he said once he had the menu open in front of him. “The reviews say the Actinidia cheesecake with caramel popcorn on top is good.”

“I wouldn’t know. We came home early because I tried to stab the waitress,” she said. She was muffled again so he assumed she’d smooshed her face into the pillow. “I spent the rest of the night with you.”

A pain in Leviathan’s thigh brought him back from the fog her statement had made of his brain. He dashed the vivid images of her topless and beckoning him to her bed. That hadn’t been what had happened. They’d all watched anime, and he’d slept on the floor until he’d realized he had to collect Mammon and get them both to bed before Lucifer did room checks, leaving Belphegor to his coma and her to her rest. He released the tight grip that had his claws digging into his leg and exhaled. She meant ‘you’ plural, ‘you’ platonically.

“Levi…”

He ignored her, needing just a little longer to try and bring his agitation under control.

“Levi. Levi. Levi!” 

She was being surprisingly tenacious. Usually she’d give him a break when she knew how tightly wound he was. Maybe her own stress made it harder for her to see his right now. He really should cut her some slack. This was so much easier when she was asleep.

“Levi! _Levi!_ **Leviathan!** ”

“WHAT?” he asked, spinning around in his chair. “What could you possibly…Oh.” He stood up and walked toward the floating ball of light over her head.

“What do I do?” she hissed, her arms still securely bound within the confines of the blanket. She had clearly tried to sink further into the comforter and it was partially swallowing her face, only the crown of her head left visible to him.

“Do? Nothing. It’s harmless,” Leviathan said, looking it over.

Its light faded into notes of blue the closer Leviathan got to them both, until it bobbed away and put her between them.

“Seems it doesn’t want me,” he said with a shrug.

She stared at it, neck craning to bring her chin over the lip of the blanket. “I’ve got nothing,” she said. “I’m done. I’m done for this week. I tap out.”

One swift tug of the blanket from Leviathan, and she could use her arms again to prop herself up on her elbows.

“When did you get a mal’akh?” he asked.

“Ohhhhhhh,” she said with sudden understanding, and shuffled up the bed to sit upright, investigating the ball of light now with much more enthusiasm. “I guess Asmo was serious. Hello there, Bright Cutie.”

Wobbling closer to her, its light became whiter and brighter; it was a beautiful moment. He loved watching her experience something new. There was so much raw awe. But then she tried to touch it with her upturned palms.

The light dimmed into a dun mauve-brown, and it dropped like a rock onto her lap.

Leviathan cackled.

“What? Wait. Why is it?” she asked, trying to understand what had just plummeted through the gap in her hands. “Leviathan, stop laughing! Why do you get a fish but I get a wombat?”


	96. Bedtime

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For once, MC goes to bed alone.  
> 47th Day, Thursday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a massive thank you to my beta readers Elvishdork and Sarchopathic!

**47th Day, Thursday**

Her wombat mal’akh wasn’t as fast as Leviathan’s fish creature, but it wasn’t as lumbering as she’d dreaded either. Leviathan had warned her that the spirit to spirit transfer of images and thoughts wasn’t something compatible with her “meat shell,” but her newest friend was kind enough to take her message cards wherever she wished and that was enough for her.

With the way Asmodeus and Leviathan had hovered anxiously near her for the rest of the day, it was a surprise when they gave in to her tired puppy eyes and let her turn in alone. She was sure they thought they were being sneaky, but each time they paced the hall, their shadows blocked the hall light that shone into her room from under the door. They were watchful, if more quiet about it than usual, and as her new messenger was sent out less frequently, their check-ins followed suit.

She tapped her pen in thought, leaving dots in the corner of her message cards. This would be so much easier if she could just transfer her thoughts to her messenger the way Leviathan did.

The more she thought about it and the longer exhaustion kept it's grip on her, it seemed supremely unfair that humans were left out of so many wonderful things. Witches and warlocks excluded. Then again, borrowing magic didn't really count as far as she was concerned. Spirits got power, multiple forms over time, and longevity.

'And what do humans get? Adaptability? Moderation?' She supposed they did get the choice of whether to go to heaven or hell; but the more she came to understand the history here the less that seemed to be a human prerogative. Spirits of all types were given perks and citizenship as demons if they would swear fealty, regardless of sin. Not everyone she'd met embraced the culture of wickedness or vice, they just existed as they always had: as nymphs, as satyr, and faeries and brownies. They had all slowly been brought into the fold and out of the human realm. Had anything really changed for them? They were still the remote and secret hidden things that humans couldn't comprehend. Does it really matter who's land sheltered them or if their titles changed?

Being labelled a “meat shell” by Leviathan was just another example in a long list of instances where she was jarred into remembering that they were spirits who had taken material form. The last twenty-four hours had brought that glaringly to the fore. She was lucky Luke hadn’t manifested as a tower of cloud or a flaming chariot. Knowing her luck, Simeon’s true form would melt her face like the arc of the covenant.

Her free hand touched her solar plexus where the sharp points of the harada spectre had almost reached her after passing through Beelzebub’s chest. She shuddered at the phantom sensation of his blood sluicing down onto her, before readjusting in her chair and returned to distracting herself with writing. There was no point in dwelling on just how material and dangerous a spiritual being could be.

Her D.D.D. contacts needed to know she had a mal’akh for her messaging needs now; after all, there was no telling how long she’d be banned from communicating on the D.D.D. network. Publedina was going to have to be a regular visitor to Purgatory Hall on her behalf.

It was ridiculous that the others continued to message her digitally, but she wasn’t allowed to answer. Maybe it was to avoid the suspicion of any prying eyes, or a matter of her GPS pinging when she added data to the system? No matter the reason, when she finally regained some semblance of motivation she would ask Lucifer; or get a burner phone.

Fortunately, Publedina never seemed to tire. Oddly, the creature seemed to warm up to her more and more with each new letter.

Her D.D.D. pinged loudly as she sent Publedina off on her next mission: Simeon. She sighed at his misunderstanding, and bade her lamps and candles to dim to almost nothing. There just wasn’t enough energy to spare right now; she’d send another message in the morning, or clarify in person when she saw him at Diavolo’s party.

* * *

Unable to breathe, she heard the creaking of her ribs and then the telltale cracking and grinding under the force squeezing around her. When her ribs punctured her stuttering lungs she heard her neck vertebrae, one at a time, begin to fracture and give way.

She spasmed awake, tangled in the bedsheets, and frantically tried to catch her breath in the dark. The cracking hadn’t stopped its rhythm and she looked at her window. Lucifer had threatened to have bars installed over it after the first time she’d escaped. Right now, she wouldn’t have minded.

There, on the other side of the window, with a hint of moonlight to create a glossy silhouette, was a familiar shape. It was quickly lost again in the dark of the clouds and fog, but she recognized her feathered friend. Her sigh of relief was loud and cathartic, and she sat up quickly, tossing off the bedding in one motion. She was lucky Karasu had woken her when they had. That particular nightmare never got any better from there.

When she got to the window, she threw up the sash, and the demonic crow squawked and flapped at the sudden movement, hopping lightly on its three feet to keep steady on the sill.

“What are you doing here at this time of night?” she asked, a cheeky grin ready for its impending chastisement. She’d been away from campus now for almost a week.

Its deep croup startled her. Usually, its calls were much cuter when begging for bits of bread at RAD. It flew off before she had a chance to even change her surprised expression. Hands on the inner sill, she leaned out into the night. “Karasu?”

The sound of trees snapping in the distance reached her and she quickly pulled her head back inside. Wards worked even when the window or door was open, didn’t they? 

She turned to face her own tree, lifting her chin toward its branches and with that motion lit the room. The magic wasn’t hers but thankfully it had learned to recognize her.

Little, black, dinosaur talons clacked next to her fingertips, as if it'd never flown off. “Speedy little thing,” she said, looking at the crow demon carefully. It wasn’t unusual for them to skitter about, but they didn’t often disappear without a prize or promise of one. “It’s surprising you and Mammon don’t squabble over who’s the fastest.”

Tilting forward slowly, Karasu’s beak opened over top of her hand, but the expected nip never came, instead something warm and heavy dropped against her skin. She would have jerked away in surprise, but one of their feet was already covering her last two fingers.

Well, it wasn’t a candy wrapper or something dead. That was already an improvement over the usual presents she received in return.

When Karasu hopped back again, their sweet little caws returned, preening for her, and proudly celebrating the newest shiny they’d brought for her appraisal. 

It was round like most currencies, the same metal throughout, gold with a hint of red, but she couldn't make heads or tails of it. The tiny brassy beads that held the inner circles in place reminded her of the nubbins circling pennies, but the three little feet stationed within the inner ring of gold made her think it was jewelry. 

There was plenty of jewelry she'd never seen until arriving in the Devildom, trinkets curved around tentacles, or hooked into calluses and bone like tinsel on a tree; it meant that the prerequisite dangling of human jewelry was an unnecessary trait now. It was too stylized for her to say for sure what it was meant to depict, she’d met quite a few creatures with feet in multiples of three, but she decided it was a picture of Karasu or its kin. How interesting.

“My, what a pretty picture of a pretty bird,” she said, holding the weighted curio in her palm. With the fingertips of her free hand, she stroked the downy feathers below its slightly hooked beak. She took the peaceful moment gratefully, fully sinking into the simple comfort. Karasu hadn’t visited out this way since the first time he’d tapped and squawked at her D.D.D., impatiently hopping about until she’d figured out the settings. Somehow, she’d still managed better with Karasu than Simeon had with Luke to walk him through the device’s functions.

Her finger met cool air instead of warm feather and it brought her attention back to the present. 

Cocking their head from side to side, Karasu created a mixture of hoarse and grating coos. The caws, rattles, and clicks were given quietly and in rambling fashion. It reminded her of Mammon when he was excited for a new money making opportunity. 

When she tilted her own head to the side, it squawked and flapped its wings at her again, mouth wide with apparent frustration. 

“I’m trying to figure out what you want,” she said, “I just don’t understand yet.” Carefully setting the metal piece down, she braced both her hands on the sill and moved her feet away from the wall to lower herself and focus all her attention on the crow demon in front of her.

Karasu picked up the golden object once more, giving annoyed little clicks and rattles as he softly raked at her hand.

Confused, she turned her hand over, and the trinket dropped into her palm. “You want me to keep it?” she asked.

Bobbing their head rapidly as they bent their knees, Karasu gave a triumphant, if croaky, trill.

She smiled widely. “See, I can figure it out if you’re patient,” she said, reaching out to stroke its inky feathers once more.

Without another sound to her, Karasu turned around and kicked off her window sill, disappearing into the darkness.

“Oh,” she said, standing dumbly, still looking out. “Okay then.” Maybe one day she’d figure out demon interaction. Until then, her flimsy human body needed sleep, non-nightmare sleep preferably. So she shut the window and turned back to her bed, intent on doing just that. 

The room seemed empty without at least one of her demons crashing on the carpet with pillows strewn everywhere, or hogging her blankets. The new bed was lonely and large enough for her to feel like a doll in it. She stopped in the bathroom to splash some water on her face and wash away the bad dreams, fastening the new bauble around her neck with a bright chain. She’d have to ask Asmodeus about it; he had an eye for jewelry and would likely know something about the design if not the designer.

But even with her new friendship necklace, as soon as she lay back down images replayed behind her eyelids. Which were memories and which were figments? At this point, even if they were just bad dreams, any one of them could come true tomorrow; so did it really matter if they were real or imagined just a few minutes ago? They were real enough right now. 

Being alone always left too much time for thought. Frustrated, she flapped her hand at the lights to get them to wink out again, and pulled the blankets back up around herself, before rolling to her side. She rubbed her nose and cheek into her pillow with a frustrated determination and fiddled the warm, metal trinket between her thumb and finger, pawing it through the fabric of her shirt. 

There was nothing for her topside, it’s what made her a perfect candidate for the “exchange,” but her chances of survival here kept getting slimmer. Each day she had to fight a little bit harder for natural sleep. She considered pulling the blanket over her head to keep the figmented monsters at bay.

A creak from the other side of her room and she broke from her thoughts. ‘It’s nothing. Just the house settling.’ Her breathing hitched when the lock of her door turned sharply and released the latch with a purposeful ‘ _click!_ ’ 

Pinching the meat of her thigh, she willed herself to still be dreaming. She wanted to close her eyes, wanted Karasu to wake her again, or even Asmo and his lockpicking tail to be the reason for her stomach cramping into knots.

When the door opened silently, eyes glowed out of the now darkened hall, and she started up and away, already moving to leap from the bed by the time she finally recognized the outline of her intruder. 

“Beelzebub!” she whispered with angry relief, clutching at the fabric over her heart. “You nearly scared me half to death!”


	97. A Good Night’s Rest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC wants to sleep. However, there is a very sweet but angry demon that needs to talk to her first.
> 
> 47th Day, Thursday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to my beta readers Elvishdork and Sarchopathic!!

_ When the door opened silently, eyes glowed out of the now darkened hall, and she started up and away, already moving to leap from the bed by the time she finally recognized the outline of her intruder.  _

_ “Beelzebub!” she whispered with angry relief, clutching at the fabric over her heart. “You nearly scared me half to death!”  _

She fell back onto the mattress. “My heart isn’t made for this place,” she muttered to herself.

The door closed and a ‘ _ clunk _ ’ of metal sounded against her nightstand, while Beelzebub brought the lights up just enough for her to see. There would be no hiding in the dark for her tonight after all.

“I brought you your key,” he said, his words delivered simply, as if she hadn’t commanded him last night to fight so that she could run away from his protection. 

“Thanks,” she said, trying to imitate his calm. What exactly did Satan have Beelzebub help him with that could have drained away the strain that had been obvious in every line of his body earlier?

“Can I sit?” he asked, when she returned to staring at the ceiling. 

“Yeah, go ahead.” She was too awake to sleep now anyway so she strummed her fingers nervously under her breast bone as he sat. The tapping reminded her too much of how his blood had dripped quickly down onto her -  _ splat, splat, splat - _ and she moved her hand to cover her belly button instead. “Are you okay? Earlier you were…Did you want to talk about last night?” she asked uncertainly, feeling his stare even without looking. She rolled to face him and patted the mattress next to her.

“I never would’ve hurt you,” he said, “but I’m glad Levi and Satan are willing to guard you from anyone, even me.” 

Watching him as he lay down on his side, his seriousness reminded her of how he’d frowned the first time they’d met. Once he’d eaten, the frown hadn’t disappeared. It had taken weeks of befriending Mammon and Leviathan until Beelzebub could be convinced to be alone with her, when he’d finally trusted himself not to eat her accidentally. 

She smiled softly at the memory. After that she’d begun finding little gifts: A new pen left on her desk, a little necklace that spelled ‘spicy’ in cursive, chocolate scented soap. At first she had thought that it was Asmodeus’ doing, or Mammon’s, but more and more Beelzebub began asking for hugs, to hold her hand while they walked. He’d never admitted to leaving the gifts, but the way his eyes lit up when she used or wore them said what he wouldn’t. Honestly, the travel BBQ set couldn’t have made it any more obvious. It was hard to see the grim expression return to his face now.

“I am still _ very _ angry with you,” he said, “and hurt.”

It was hard to keep eye contact with him. It felt like she’d kicked a puppy. She nodded, waiting for him to continue.

“I was afraid to let you trust me when I made a pact with you. It’s too easy to let someone down. And you know I blamed myself for Lilith, but you still wanted to give me your trust. How could I turn that away?” His hand slid to cover his stomach and gripped lightly at his shirt. “I never considered you wouldn’t trust me when it mattered most.”

Furrowing her brow, she found herself biting her tongue and rolling the pressure of her teeth across it to keep from chiming in. 

“If you’re going to trust me, then I need you to give me _ all _ of your trust, not just when it suits you. Trust me to know what I can and can’t withstand.” His words were plaintive.

This would’ve been easier if he’d been angry. “What does all of my trust look like to you, Beelzebub?” she asked carefully, wiping her hands against the bedspread, her palms still sweaty after the nightmares and her waking fright.

“I need you to stop putting yourself in danger.”

It felt like he was staring into her soul with how intensely he was focused on her.

“I can’t do my best if you’re undermining me like that.” 

The blanket under her hands was suddenly very interesting. Had Lucifer replaced her blankets for a larger size in the exact same colours when he replaced her bed?

“I need you to listen and do what I tell you when you’re in danger. I need you to trust me to know my own limits.” He paused until she looked up again, and nodded that she was listening. 

It was hard to keep looking at him when it seemed as though all of the sunshine had been sucked out of him, and it was her fault. It  _ is _ her fault, but she wasn’t sure she would do anything differently if she had the chance.

“Demons are resilient,” he continued. He took her hand and slid it under his shirt to press her palm to his unmarred torso. “We can look like the walking dead and still survive. Some of us can live with only a head to regenerate from. There’s no reason that you, _a_ _human_ , should ever be intervening, or more likely sacrificing yourself!” 

Could he tell how much hurting him pained her?

His voice softened. “I know you saved me and Luke from Lucifer, but that can’t keep happening. I can’t stand the thought of relying on luck when it comes to your life.”

She breathed deeply and let it out slowly. Luck and following her gut had served her well down here, but she wasn’t willing to argue that point right now. “Answer my question honestly,” she said instead, locking eyes with him. “Would you have let yourself die over me last night if it meant saving me?”

His hand tensed around hers, keeping her from pulling away. “It wasn’t like that! It wouldn’t have turned out that way.”

She raised an eyebrow in a manner reminiscent of Lucifer when he was awaiting a confession, and she could tell it irked Beelzebub by the way his jaw clenched. 

“No, I wouldn’t have let myself die over you,” he said, clearly trying to keep from snapping the words at her.

After what seemed like forever, she finally spoke. Her mouth felt dry. “Did you say no, because you would have impaled me if you’d died over me?”

He pressed his lips firmly together and looked away.

“I see,” she said, watching his free hand clench and unclench between them.

“Tell me you won’t do it again,” he demanded, still unwilling to look at her.

Ignoring the way the muscle in his jaw flexed, she said “I’m not sure I can,” and tried to withdraw her hand out from under his without success.

“It’s not just me you’re putting your trust in!” he said, tugging her hand higher up his chest while he pressed forward into what remained of her personal space. “Leviathan came as soon as we called.” 

She swallowed thickly. The urge to curl up against him for comfort felt all kinds of wrong, but she wanted it.

“There was never a chance of me dying,” he said, “but you didn’t trust me to know that. Your retreat put all of us in danger!”

Her eyes lowered from his again, and he released her hand to grab her shoulder, forcing her attention back to his face to continue seeing his pain and frustration.

“I know I’m not as good at overall strategy as Satan or Lucifer, but I know my tactics, and I know my squad. Rome didn't defeat Hannibal at Cannae because the Cartheginians had more soldiers; they won because I kept them alive.”

It was a serious moment, but she was having trouble not showing her surprise, and then amusement, at the bomb he’d dropped. She imagined him playing translator for the Cartheginian army, and feeding the elephants, maybe lifting them over the worst of the Alps. 

“ _ How on Earth did they keep you fed _ ?” she asked, murmuring it mostly to herself. Sometimes, it was hard to remember just how many lifetimes they must’ve lived before her.

He leaned away so as not to laugh directly in her face. “Poorly, that's why I wasn’t there to help later at Zama.” Clearly, he hadn’t been expecting that response.

“Have you eaten yet?” she asked. The smile she offered him was warm, but it was clear to both of them that she was avoiding the question of her trust. 

“I have,” he said. “Will you follow my lead when it comes to dangerous situations?”

“I’ll...do my best.”

“That’s not a yes, but you’re very bad at saying that when I’m not inside you,” he grumbled.

Her eyes went wide. “Beel!” 

“It’s true, but now I know better than to believe your promises while I’m pleasuring you.”

Her mouth fell open, and he slid his hand down her arm, taking her hand back in his, this time to kiss it.

“Have you forgiven me?” she asked, trying to regain her composure. Blushing wasn’t something she wanted to do during their serious talk. 

“Mostly. Talking to you always makes me feel better; it even makes the emptiness a little better.” He began to kiss each of her fingertips in turn, and peeked over her knuckles to ask, “Have you apologized to Leviathan?”

Forehead creased with the beginnings of another frown, she focused on his lips against her hand. “We decided to call it even after the Valentine’s day incident.”

Before she understood what was happening, Beelzebub pulled her hand behind him, closing the distance between them, and captured her lips in a kiss. It was slow and sweet, with a faint urgency, not unlike when he’d first kissed her in the shower: a reassurance.

“Sorry,” he said as he guided their hands back to the space between them. His expression oscillated between relief and uncertainty. “Should I not have?” His breath was warm and sweet against her face.

“I missed you today, too.” 

He was visibly relieved when she shifted to cuddle against him. The lines of tension around his mouth relaxed, and she watched his eyes close. The only thing that continued to hold tension was his hand around hers. 

“Bed down in my room tonight,” he said, keeping his eyes closed. “I promise not to so much as breathe in your direction if that’s what you want, but I would feel better knowing you’re next to me.”

‘Safe in my arms’ was what she heard from within his hushed rumbling and something like a cold wind. Maybe yearning? “What’s wrong with my new bed?” she asked.

Opening his eyes, he let them plead his case. “Let me be selfish?” 

Those sad puppy eyes always did her in. “Okay, we can go to your room tonight.” 

No sooner had the words left her mouth, than she was aloft in his arms. Without a word, his long strides bore them down the hall to his darkened room, and as they made their way under the bed covers, she quickly found herself with her back tucked against his chest. 

After Mammon had made her room the official sleepover location, she’d become a little spoon more often than not, but whenever Beelzebub cuddled up behind her, it always felt like being a teaspoon instead. “This reminds me of when you destroyed the kitchen wall,” she said, “after you gave up trying to sleep on the couch.”

“Seems about right,” he said, pinching at the collar of her night shirt. “You were having nightmares then too.”

Touching her shirt, she realized it was still damp from the earlier splash of cold water. “Well, I promise to share my future custards with you, if you promise to stop destroying my walls, how’s that?”

His arms withdrew from around her, and he leaned himself up on his forearm, creating a tent over her with the height gap between them. “Are you being serious?”

She rolled over to face him, ungracefully attempting to untangle her legs from his in the process.

“You realize that’s practically a marriage proposal when you’re talking to the Avatar of Gluttony?” he said.

“Ack!” With a thud, she fell off the side of the bed. 

Her giggles signaled that she wasn’t injured, but he’d brought up the lights marginally anyway.

“Five second rule!” she said before scurrying back under the covers.

“What rule?” he asked, perplexed.

“If you pick it up off the floor in under five seconds, it’s still good to eat.”

He put his hand over his face, and let out an exasperated laugh, before grabbing her and rolling them both into the middle of the bed. “Come here, no more sleeping near the edge. I’ll keep you safe, Belit.”

* * *

It was late when Belphegor trudged into their room. He could magic off his clothing, but it was more satisfying to toss them at the floor after the day he’d had.

When he knelt on the edge of his mattress, to crawl into bed, the soft blanket he expected to find didn’t touch his bare leg. ‘Perfect. Just perfect. How fitting an end to the day.’

Before he could open the chest for more blankets, a small noise brought his attention to the other side of the room. Sounds like that meant company. It was a faint somniloquy, likely female, or small, judging by the pitch, but Beelzebub’s bedding covered them from his view.

Briefly, he considered whether Beelzebub had taken a consolation prize for the evening, but tossed the idea away when he heard the sound again. It was _ her _ sleep mutterings. He’d heard them often enough to place them quickly.

‘Stupid of me to doubt Beel’s zealousness,’ he thought, spying his purple blanket draped over the end of the other bed. How had that gotten there?

As quietly as possible, he made his way to the other side of the room. 

Beelzebub cracked an eye open at Belphegor’s approach, only closing it again when he’d recognized his twin as the one lifting the blankets to join them. It wasn’t surprising that Beelzebub was still on high alert. He’d nearly destroyed the mausoleum in his haste during his restoration task. Returning to their human hadn’t seemed to have dulled that urgency much in either of them.

Keeping some distance, Belphegor was still close enough to feel her body heat when she reached out for him. He knew she was deeply asleep, but still she was the one to pull him closer as he settled in. Her unconscious search for him was a pleasant surprise, and for once he didn’t immediately let himself slumber. 

Lying awake, despite the painful draw of fatigue, he enjoyed the moment. The three of them had napped together before, but this was different, and she would have known it was different when she decided to sleep here. He listened to their measured breathing, letting it dismantle all of the bad from his day.

When she spoke again in her sleep his heart almost stopped. It was the faintest of whispers, yet it had held enough energy to stir the hair across his face. Her hands against his chest rose and fell quickly with his rapid breathing. 

It wasn’t quite panic, but the insistence he pushed through their bond would have been enough to wake Beelzebub without anything else. “Beel,” he called out quietly, prodding at the sleepy membrane of his mind, and at his shoulder. “Wake up.”

“Wha?” Beelzebub asked, finally having let himself rest deeply only to be jerked out from it.

Belphegor held a finger to his lips, and looked down at her, waiting expectantly. 

Time ticked by, and Beelzebub dozed lightly, waiting for whatever it was that kept Belphegor alert. This time he heard it.  _ Felt it _ .

Her arm slid around Belphegor’s middle and she nuzzled against him while she murmured.

And Beelzebub stared into the darkness between them, stunned to hear Celestial speech in the depths of hell.

Belphegor barely breathed out the words as they caught in his throat. “She said my name.” It had been so long since he’d heard it said, and he covered his eyes so that Beelzebub wouldn’t see how they leaked with emotion.


	98. Affection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A sort of cozy wake-up call after the drama of the day before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, a big thanks to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for their beta reading of this chapter!

When she was a child, she had loved physical affection: she loved the hugs her mother gave; the kisses her grandmother chased her for; the ‘job well done’ pats, high fives, tackles, wrestling, and thumb wars with cousins and friends. Somewhere along the way, she had lost that, only to find it again in the Devildom.

She revelled in the warmth around her, blanket tossed off in favour of a single sheet and the two bodies sandwiching hers. It felt different than the faint memory of childhood affection. It was calming in the same way, but also made her heart beat faster. 

At some point in the night she must’ve rolled over because Beelzebub was snuggled into her chest, her shins flat against his thighs so that his bent legs made his feet dangle off the side of the bed. She hadn’t been sure that Belphegor would be coming home last night, but she recognized his hold around her, and caught a peek of his painted nails. 

Rolling over completely and lifting her upper body as best she could, she peered over Belphegor’s shoulder, only setting herself back down when she found it was six o’clock. His eyes were droopy but open when she settled back into the mattress.

“Sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

He closed his eyes and gave a quiet ‘ _hmm_ ’ before enfolding her in his arms again, this time to face him.

Ready to drift back to sleep, and leave all of the thinking for later, she was kept from it by the sensation of Belphegor rubbing his cheek against the top of her head. 

“Belphiiie,” she said, before faltering in her hushed complaint. She heard him breathe in deeply above her, practically scenting her with his nuzzling, before he stopped to kiss the top of her head. “Are you keeping me awake as punishment for waking you?” she asked, already dozing off as she spoke.

The soft laughter that answered her told her it wasn’t revenge. “No, it’s fine. In fact," he said, before giving her ass a lazy squeeze. “I give you permission to wake me if you get horny.”

She dragged the tip of her tongue over the warm skin of his neck. “For the Avatar of Sloth, it’s surprising that you’re so indefatigable.” It earned her another squeeze.

“Mmm. What can I say,” he mumbled above her, “you’re worth waking up for.”

Her tiredness warred with the quiet delight his words created, but with Beelzebub shifting behind her, now breathing heat between her shoulder blades, she slid back into a dreamless slumber for the first time in what felt like months, feeling completely safe.

When she did wake again, she lay there on her back, enjoying the weight of Belphegor’s arm across her chest, his hand resting on her shoulder. Somehow she’d managed to create more space for herself in her sleep than she had ever managed to make while awake in her own bed. Beelzebub was halfway down the mattress, arms curled around her legs, his face tucked into the dip of her waist; he kept her hemmed in, but it was still more room overall than she usually had in her own bed.

The sound of two D.D.D.s pinging with alerts reminded her that she’d left hers in her room, and that despite the comforting heaviness of the demons draped over her, it was likely time to get up. It was her turn to cook breakfast, and she wasn’t going to settle for Flameo’s this morning. It was, so far, the only cereal she’d found that prided itself on combining the great taste of burning cardboard with the fun texture of gravel. Definitely a Mammon only meal. She had almost climbed over Belphegor, the less broad of her two hurdles, when Beelzebub pulled her back down. 

“Humans aren’t allowed near the edge of the bed,” he said, scooting his way up the mattress to hum and mumble words sleepily against the soft place behind her ear. “ _Baju-bajuški-baju, ne ložisja na kraju. Pridët seren’ki volčok i uhvatit za bočok_ ,1" he said. It might have been a song, but it was difficult to tell with the rasp of his sleepy morning voice. 

It sounded like a sad warning, and it melted her back against him, even with the incessant dinging of their D.D.D.s nearby. “As perfectly lazy and cozy as this is,” she said, reaching behind her to stroke Beelzebub’s messy bedhead, “I’m on breakfast duty. I should get up.”

“You can’t leave,” Belphegor said. He didn’t open his eyes, but his hand searched for her waist until his thumb swept across the exposed skin where her shirt had ridden up. “Beel said you’re the filling to our Boston cream donut.”

She felt Beelzebub stiffen behind her, and his stomach growled. Belphegor was most certainly still asleep, and she laughed at the secret he’d accidentally divulged. “Well, you two are much _firmer_ than I am,” she said poking Belphegor’s stomach. “However, I don’t think either of you are doughy enough to be pastry.”

Their D.D.D.s had stopped sounding, and a loud thumping could be heard from far away, and then the slamming of doors became recognizable to her as it drew nearer to their room. 

With a groan, Beelzebub rolled out of bed, seconds before Mammon careened through the door.

“There you are!” he said, pointing at her. “Why do none of you answer your D.D.D.s?”

She covered her wide yawn with her hand, ignoring the way Belphegor pulled a pillow over his head and flexed his hand at her waist, strumming pressure, one finger at a time, against her skin in a weak attempt to beckon her closer.

“Good morning, Mammon,” Beelzebub said, his arms crossed as he watched Mammon’s comical entrance, and frowned his discontent at the intrusion. He looked far more intimidating than anyone should in such small shorts.

“Yeah, mornin’ to you too. Let’s go, human. Time is money and you’re wastin’ mine.”

He couldn’t be that eager for breakfast. Even Beelzebub’s stomach had only had the chance to grumble once. She began crawling out of the bed nonetheless. “What’s up?” she asked. 

Already halfway rolled out of bed, her world tilted as Mammon picked her up and flipped her over himself, until he had an arm and a leg hanging over his shoulders in a fireman's carry. 

“You are,” he said with amusement.

Holding up a hand to keep Beelzebub from thumping Mammon and re-collecting her, she patted Mammon’s head. “It seems my kitchen duty transportation has arrived. I’ll see you two at breakfast.” She gave a little wave to them both, losing sight of Beelzebub’s confusion and Belphegor’s distaste, finally uncovered from his pillow, as Mammon turned to leave.

He closed the door behind them and leisurely made his way towards her room.

“Is there a reason the fire brigade has come to collect me?” she asked.

“No one knew where you were,” he said.

“I’ve never had to report where I was sleeping in the house before,” she said, her voice rising up at the end to make it a question. She craned her neck to blow a stream of air at his face when he didn’t answer and he ignored her antics.

Taking the long route to her room, his pace slowed the closer they got.

“Mammoneeey, don’t be so cold.” It wasn’t like him to be quiet for so long. It felt like being carried by a stranger, and she began to move, shifting to try and get herself down.

It had been startling to meet creatures who had been more touch starved than she was, even more strange because they were the last creatures she’d expected to want affection. They had been the first to normalize it, even while decrying it; but now it was what was getting her through each day, and she wasn’t willing to put up with being ignored right now.

Mammon gave the arm and the leg in his hands a reassuring squeeze before he opened her door and stepped inside, setting her down carefully. “You should go get dressed for breakfast,” he said, letting his eyes scan her room instead of looking at her.

This was stupid. “Or, we could snuggle and make up instead of being stuck in this weird limbo,” she said as she reached for him.

But each time she reached for him he brushed her hands aside.

“Mammon!” she said. She knew she sounded like a spoilt child, but she didn’t care. She knew he wanted comfort from her as much as she wanted to comfort him. “Why won’t you let me—”

There was no apprehension from her this time when Mammon pressed her against the wall. 

“Stop,” he said, looking at the door instead of her. “If I kiss you then there’s no going back. I won’t be able to stop wanting more.” 

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “We’ve kissed plenty of times, even just this week.” She felt his hands tighten their grip around her shoulders.

“No,” he said, his words thick. “I mean, I enjoyed it, but I can’t again or-or...”

“I’ve told you before that I’m happy to be with you, kisses or not,” she said softly as she reached for his cheek. The moment her palm made contact, she watched his eyes close as he turned and nuzzled into her touch.

The barest brush of his lips pressed against her thumb and it looked like he was in pain the way he held himself, frozen in a moment that should have been a comfort.

Her arm was trapped between them when he surged forward. His kiss was desperate as he ground his body against hers. His thumbs were on her cheekbones and he held her in place under the pressure of his lips against hers.

But the moment she leaned into him, he pushed away. “No, no. I’m sorry—I shouldn’t have. I’m leaving.”

The door was closed behind him before she could figure out what had happened, her hands still in front of her, stunned.

Throwing the door wide open, she shouted down the empty hallway. “STOP FUCKING WITH MY FEELINGS JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE UNSURE OF YOUR OWN, MAMMON!” She slammed the door for good measure. ‘So much for helping him come to terms with my budding new relationships,’ she thought sourly. ‘UGH. Infuriating Demon! Jealous. Not jealous. Wants kisses. Doesn’t want kisses. Can’t stop talking. Not a peep! Next time I see him I’m going to tie him up so he can’t run away!’

Running her fingers through her hair, the guilt seeped in from the loneliness of the room. Yelling at him wouldn’t help. It would do the opposite. She knew better. “Fuuuuuuuuck,” she said, sighing the word angrily. She collected her D.D.D. and found more than eighty messages from Mammon while he’d been searching the house for her.

Flopping onto her empty bed, she messaged his Infernal Haughtiness to request an audience after lunch. 

It was concerning when Lucifer instantly replied that he’d been about to ask the same of her. Double fuck. She’d forgotten about not using the phone functions yet. They still hadn’t sorted out the privacy issue.

A quick scroll through everyone’s chats, and she realized that Mammon had been trying to “quietly” search for her for some time before he’d begun messaging her.

His concern seemed over the top, but the longer she thought about it she couldn’t blame him. Every time she disappeared, she’d managed to get maimed in one way or another over the past two days. There were clearly other issues at play as well, maybe some chronic PTSD or abandonment issues that existed long before her. What kind of horrible flashbacks had she accidentally given him in the last forty-eight hours? 

Tossing the device aside, she got up and dug out clothing for the day. She’d hunt him down later and pry a discussion out of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   1. Baby, baby, rock-a-bye / Baby, baby, rock-a-bye / On the edge you mustn’t lie / Or the little grey wolf will come / And will nip you on the tum, / And will nip you on the tum / Tug you off into the wood / Underneath the willow-root This lullaby is why Beelzebub said humans aren't allowed near the edge of the bed. Russian: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8f8WYvAo-RA English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lA6diOlG0s4 [ ▲ ]
> 



	99. Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I know you keep almost dying and all, but we already changed around the meal plan twice, so, MC, you're still on breakfast duty.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the reposting, my dear readers. I reviewed my work and realized you didn't have the most up to date version. Life has been a little crazy so I apologize <3
> 
> Once again, a big thanks to Elvishdork and sarchopathic for their beta reading of this chapter!
> 
> Thank you to everyone for your patience. My work schedule was shifted over by a day and it befuddled me. Please expect chapter 100 at the same regular time!

Tying on an apron, she flexed her arms back and forward, testing the amount of movement she had. Between the lesser potion, Leviathan’s patchwork, and sleeping next to Beelzebub, her back felt like it already had weeks to heal.

A part of her recognized it for how unnatural it was, but she drove that away, focusing instead on breakfast and gratitude for what she had. 

On the counter top, bowls and utensils clattered into place one after the other as she dug through the drawers and cupboards. Ingredients made their way to the sink to soak, rinse, or transform. Her hair pinned out of her eyes, about to begin, she raised her knife over what passed for a bunch of spring onions here, but paused when she heard the kitchen door nearest her bedroom swing open.

“Beel, I didn’t expect you. I thought for sure you’d be out for a run since you slept in with us.” Her words slowed the longer she talked, until she trailed off shyly, unaccustomed to saying ‘us’ other than platonically. Not that their sleep had been anything other than platonic. She still wasn’t entirely sure what they were after last night.

“I wish,” he said, as he brought his hand up to rub behind his ear. “I’m going to be making the rounds as soon as breakfast is over.”

“The rounds?” She turned back to the cutting board and began to dice the greens.

“Yeah, we each mingle with a sector, or interest group outside of our sins, but it’s usually more relaxed and infrequent,” he said, drawing closer. “I can manage mine through my day to day just by going to a new place to eat, meeting different food vendors, or playing fangol.”

“Huh, I guess that explains why Levi drags himself out to Hocus Pocus.” She’d always wondered why the rulers of the realm would take up menial jobs. “That doesn’t explain the button up,” she said, motioning towards his blue shirt. “Your second breakfast plans sound nice, but why do you need to change your usual routine and outfit?”

“Today isn’t a usual day,” he said, wrapping his arms around her waist from behind.

She stopped chopping to focus on keeping her body from tensing. His unshielded attention was still something she was only just getting used to. She’d been swept away by Mammon before she could get to awkward pillow talk. Was this their new normal? “What’s so different about today?” she asked. 

“Two attacks in the same night,” he said, lowering his head to leave a gentle kiss at her temple. “I need to make greater contact with my in-groups, find information, and figure out the general feel of things.”

“Hmm,” she said before reaching up behind herself to flick his collar. “And the shirt?” 

“I don’t have to start the conversation if I wear something different.” He kissed her cheek and then her jaw, bending himself around her. “Everyone uses it as an icebreaker.”

“Will you be staying for breakfast?” It was hard to focus on making words with his warmth at her back. She kept her eyes open, despite the temptation to close them and ignore her duties in favour of the affection he so openly gave her.

“I don’t think you could keep me away.” His hands uncrossed themselves from around her waist and travelled down the sides of her thighs.

“You behave yourself, or there won’t be anything to eat,” she said, swatting at him gently before stepping away. “Would you prefer to be useful, or do you want to be my taste tester?”

“Aren’t those the same thing?” he asked, before picking up an enormous block of cheese and grating it without issue. It was hard not to be envious of how much easier it was for a demon to cook in a demon’s kitchen.

Slowly, she relaxed into the easiness of breakfast preparation together, and they moved past one another like clockwork. It was nice. She couldn’t remember now why she’d been worried things would be awkward. ‘Icecream  _ is _ better with sprinkles,’ she thought.

She heard the clank of one of the larger woks being put over the hearth grate as she entered the larder. Usually, she had a Little Demon or two to help her, but it seemed that Beelzebub had decided to take their place entirely this morning. It took some adjusting of her usual patterns for cooking, but the most difficult task had become keeping her concentration. He changed one outfit and suddenly she couldn’t look anywhere else.

A bushel of anqa eggs balanced on her hip, and various other vegetable-like ingredients cradled precariously in her other arm, she nudged the larder door back open, and then kicked it shut behind her, making her way back to the table to heft her bizarre mixture of abundance across it.

After counting off what she’d need on her fingers, she pulled down additional woks and a saucepan. “Beel, can you grab this bowl down for me?” Why did they always put the heaviest items away so high up?

Immediately, he was at her side, reaching above her to collect it, and pinning her to the counter rather than let her move first. A curl of want, low in her belly, stretched out into her chest to squeeze at her lungs and made her flex her fingers uselessly against the countertop.

Turning around when he walked the mixing bowl to the prep table, she breathed out slowly. “Thanks.”

The little grin he gave her left her in no doubt that he knew exactly what he’d done. She didn’t miss the way he licked his lips.

“Just for that you’re in charge of the big wok,” she said, trying to calm the heat of her cheeks. 

If he had a problem with his new assignment Beelzebub said nothing; he chopped and minced with little direction while she worked on cracking the large, dark green eggs, and once again, things seemed to settle into a cozy rhythm. Their companionable silence warmed her, lulling her into a sense of security. Calm mornings like this were her favourite, and this one was long overdue.

When their prep work was finally completed, she had Beelzebub pour the majority of the beaten egg mixture into the largest pan, reserving some for other more specialized dishes. There would be no whiny demons at the table this morning if she had anything to do with it! Peace was going to reign in the house, even if it was only for one meal.

Adding vegetables to sautée in the large wok, she gave a contented hum before turning to focus on the “smaller” dishes. She had  _ thought  _ Beelzebub would be kept distracted between the little snacks she’d made him and having to ensure the massive omelette didn’t burn, but she was wrong. The warmth of his hand as it grasped her hip was nearly as warm as the waves of heat rolling off the hearth.

“Beelzebub,” she said, her tone holding a weak warning. He was just too sweet to chastise as she would Asmodeus. It didn’t help that she wanted to drag him back to bed, if only for cuddles. “If you distract me, I’ll end up burning breakfast.”

He shoved the large wok off of the flames without looking away from her. “We can always remake it,” he said and moved closer and kissed her neck. Her gasp and the way she bit her lip only seemed to encourage him. 

“I have a few moments to spare while this simmers,” she muttered. Grabbing his collar, she pulled him off balance so that he was eye to eye with her. “You’re going to get yourself into trouble, Mister.” She whispered the words inches from his lips and watched his expression shift into one of surprise.

“You should’ve stayed and let me have you for breakfast in bed,” he said. His eyes flit down to her mouth as he spoke.

‘Cheeky.’ She pulled him lower, dropping him to his knees. 

His mesmerizing eyes closed and his hands moved to roam under her apron. 

“Such a disobedient demon.” She wished she’d stayed too, but settled for threading her hands into his hair and pressing her tongue into his mouth. He moaned around the intrusion and she unbuttoned most of his shirt without him noticing. 

With a quick tug, his shirt was down around his elbows and she broke their kiss, pulling away to let the air of the kitchen hit his skin. She nearly rubbed her thighs together for relief at the full body start that shook him. Oh, what she wouldn’t give to see all the expressions he could make for her. 

The strings of her oversized apron were dangling to the floor, courtesy of Beelzebub’s roving hands. She pulled the protective wear off and bound his hands together in front of him with the entire garment. “Don’t think to turn those puppy eyes on me, Beel.” A quick peck on his lips vanquished his pout. “Taste testers don’t need their hands to work.”

He didn’t have time to argue anyway. The door at the other side of the kitchen swung open and, pushing aside one of the kitchen towels hung to dry at head height, Satan stepped through.

Stopping abruptly, his eyes lingered over Beelzebub’s exposed back and bound hands before jumping to her face. “Should I ask?”

“Not unless you want the answer,” she said, turning back to the simmering pans and stuffing down the urge to facepalm, or maybe just crawl into the pantry with embarrassment. What had she been thinking? She'd become too comfortable and just undressed Beelzebub in the middle of the kitchen where anyone could walk in.

“Right then. Anything I should be concerned about?” Satan asked, obviously still carefully committing everything before him to memory.

She looked down to her side where Beelzebub was blushing heavily. “Nothing to concern yourself with, unless you’re interested?” she asked, the cheekiness of her smile and weak roll of her eyes lent a lightness to the situation. “Otherwise, pass me that spoon.”

Striding forward, Satan took up the large utensil and passed it to her over Beelzebub’s shoulder; she dipped it in the sauce, turning it to coat the back of the spoon before holding it out to Beelzebub. He took a surprisingly small portion. ‘Uncomfortable,’ she thought, and took it back, only to hand it immediately to Satan. “Here, taste this.”

At first, his lips pursed and he wrinkled his nose; despite that, he still took the spoon from her and put the majority of the utensil in his mouth. “Needs more cream,” he said.

She nodded and took the spoon back, tossing it toward the sink before encouraging Beelzebub to his feet with a tug of the apron strings. “Come,” she said gently.

For someone whose knees had been against the hard stone floor, Beelzebub moved nimbly and he seated himself at the stool she led him toward. “When can I—”

“Nope. You wanted to distract me from making breakfast, so I’m going to make sure you stay exceptionally distracting.” She tickled her finger under his chin sweetly. “You’re just going to have to stay here until I’m done.” 

Beelzebub’s glance towards Satan, furtive and quick, betrayed his shyness, but it didn’t seem like actual discomfort; if anything, the way he rolled his shoulders back told her he was proud to be admired in front of their current audience.

“You don’t mind do you, Satan?” she asked, while she slid her palm along Beelzebub’s neck and down along his naked shoulder. She felt him lean into her touch. “Such a good demon,” she whispered.

Clearing his throat with a faint cough into his hand, Satan quickly answered, “No, no, not at all. I believe the saying is that good food requires love or something like that?” There was only the length of the prep table between them now. She didn’t miss the dusting of pink across his nose and cheeks, or how his other hand gripped the corner of the table.

“Good.” She kissed Beelzebub thoroughly, her hands in his hair and against his cheek, working to drive away his shyness. If she had any say in it, soon he wouldn’t even remember Satan was there.

The sound of tearing fabric was the only warning that Beelzebub had transformed.

“Sorry,” he said, pressing his forehead against her shoulder as he greedily sucked in the air she’d denied him. “I didn’t mean to—”

“I know,” she said, cupping his cheeks to tilt his face upward, and steal a chaste peck on the lips. She was pleasantly surprised he’d kept his hands on his thighs. “I’ll just have to find something stronger for next time.”

Beelzebub’s widening eyes and slack mouth did wonders for her self esteem. “Be a dear and take those off the heat for me?” she asked, motioning behind her. 

When she stepped back and turned toward Satan, a strong breeze passed behind her: Beelzebub moving to his task. She pulled out a message card and a pen before addressing her other guest. “So, what brings you to the kitchen so early?” 

Satan’s eyes flickered over to Beelzebub for a moment, and she wondered what was being communicated behind her back. There was definitely a question in the way Satan’s eyebrows rose and fell.

Leaning on the prep table she began to write on the notecard while they had their time to either posture or check on one another. It was hard to tell with them sometimes, their motions could be so subtle.

“Ah, well,” Satan said, his words awkward as he cleared his throat and the pink doubled its intensity over his cheeks. "Usually, I would ask if you need my assistance, but I see you have things well in hand."

A soft puff of air left her at his polite summation and she smiled. At least she hadn’t scared him off. 

“I came to see if you would like to read in the common room, or library, with me after breakfast, seeing as how I ruined our reading time yesterday.” 

Pen lifted from paper, she stood up straight and waved the note to dry it. “Publedina,” she said quietly to the room, giving herself a chance to think over his offer.

Satan’s eyes followed the wombat-spirit lumbering through the air toward the human, where it took up the note in its mouth. She had appeared from somewhere behind him.

“To Mammon, please,” she said, looking away from the creature and once again back to Satan. It should have been an easy answer. He and his brothers had all almost - or had - killed her, yet she was waffling over a small buzz of anxiety in her gut when she imagined something as innocuous as reading next to him again.

A loud shout of incredulity ripped through the quiet of the morning seconds later. “WHAAAT?” 

No one in the kitchen flinched.

Publedina returned like a shot a moments later, fleeing from the direction of the noise, and skittering to a stop near her fingertips, the card dropping over her hand.

Almost illegible English was scribbled on the back of her card.

> _ Why so much? Is this some sort of trick? _

She frowned and answered beneath it, ignoring both of her demons to do so. 

> _ I just really need more cream for this sauce. Also, I'm still a little sleepy, so I wanted the cold caffeine and sugar without having to drink the gross coffee here. _
> 
> _ I’m sending you half now and half after I get the drink and the cream. Be quick or you’ll miss breakfast. _

She sent the wombat mal’akh back on its way and gave an apologetic smile to Satan. “Can I see how I’m feeling after breakfast?”


	100. Omelettes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 48th Day, Friday  
> Hello and welcome to Chapter 100! If you have a chance, have a re-read of chapters 1-28, and 99 as they have been revised.
> 
> Please enjoy a very uneventful breakfast with MC.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to sarchopathic and Elvishdork for their beta reading of this chapter <3

The breakfast table was uncomfortably quiet. Only the sound of Leviathan narrating his Devilgram video of the rainbow breakfast burritos before him could be heard over the clink of cutlery. Even Mammon’s open mouthed breathing, as he tried to cool his tongue from the extra spice packets she’d added to his dish, was a pantomime of his usual panting.

She could practically hear the creaking of gears as Lucifer stared blankly ahead, wrinkling his nose occasionally as he drank his coffee. There was much to think on, but if he continued like this, Satan would get cranky about Lucifer staring through him. At least his Infernal Lordliness seemed to like the sauce she’d made to go with his eggs.

“So, can I assume there will still be a party tomorrow and classes the week after next?” she asked, while avoiding Satan’s constant appraising gaze. Best to keep the conversation light and avoid anything that would remind Lucifer she’d broken her communication ban by texting him. Knowing him, his silence now just meant he was letting her stew in apprehension for a while.

“Yes, of course,” Lucifer said. He took a drink of his coffee and grimaced. When he met her eyes, there was a hint of a smirk lingering around the corners of his mouth. “You are perfectly safe with us. We have assessed the danger and resolved any issues that would impact you.”

“I’m afraid I’ll have to take today’s placations with a grain of salt,” she said as diplomatically as she could muster. She didn’t believe a word of that broken record, even if he did. “You have to admit, you do spend a portion of every day we see one another giving me tips on how not to die while I’m here.”

Belphegor stumbled into the dining room, and dragged himself into his seat, oblivious to the tense silence around him: an accidental saviour of her smart mouth. How ironic.

“Is it too much to ask for you to be on time, just once?” Lucifer asked, breaking his staring contest with her to look over at the late arrival. 

First one voice, and then another, drowned out Belphegor’s grunt of displeasure as her five other demons clamoured to argue against her attendance anywhere, while simultaneously trying to reassure her of her safety with them. Her well meaning idiots.

Belphegor lifted the cloche on his sweet omelettes and gave her a smile; she was torn between looking away and watching him savour the meal. Their intimacy was still uncomfortably new and nowhere near as normalized as her time with Beelzebub had been this morning. What did he expect would have changed after last night and the night before last?

Eventually, Lucifer began to get the table back under control. She felt a hint of a tremor under her feet and watched as the meniscus at the top of her water glass moved ever so slightly. What had he needed to say at such a low frequency that she couldn’t hear him? Looking to Mammon on her right, she watched him start and stop his words a couple times before giving up, his shoulders sinking. Order was restored to the table. 

Lucifer grimaced again as he drank, and this time she paused, frittata halfway to her mouth. “Is something wrong?” she asked.

“Today’s coffee is quite bitter,” he said, playing it off to their audience as a failure of her brewing technique. She knew his game. His previous jibes by text about the coffee revealing feelings, the truth of one's feelings, were not forgotten. The more bitter, the more affection existed.

“Are you going to finish it?” she asked. Clearly, she had a morbid curiosity if she was needling the devil.

“Of course,” he said, setting the cup down on its saucer. “I will drink  _ every last drop _ .”

She took in the way his body language changed: his eyes closed as if to hide his self-satisfaction, his lower lids pushed up, crinkling his eyes more. Oh, his broadening smile was real, but the way his mouth pinched told her he was barely hushing his gloating. 

Without warning, she pushed her chair back, and brushed off Mammon’s questions. Stepping around Beelzebub’s seat, she moved to Lucifer’s side at the head of the table, and reached between the two to pick up the salt shaker. Slowly, she began to pour it into her waiting palm. What could Lucifer possibly know about keeping her safe when he didn’t even know how to solve his daily coffee problem? She tried not to frown as she puzzled him out. ‘Why complain and gloat about a nuisance of his own making? Only Mammon is so self-deluded.’ She continued pouring. ‘Is he doing it just to get a rise out of me?’ She grimaced and jostled the shaker to restart its stalled flow. ‘Maybe that’s where Belphegor got it from.’

Satan swatted at Mammon, trying to quiet him as they all waited to see what would happen next. She could feel the eyes of the twins on her. Beelzebub was glancing between her and Lucifer, likely moments from reaching out for her.

With one quick motion she dumped the salt into Lucifer’s cup and he leaned back in surprise. Taking up his teaspoon, she stirred the salt in, striking the edges of the mug, before loudly slurping a sample from the spoon. 

Asmodeus clutched at Leviathan’s coat with one hand, patting animatedly at the arm he had taken hostage, but he’d managed not to make a sound yet.

Dropping the utensil onto Lucifer’s saucer like a mic, she stepped around the skull embellished leg of the table, and returned silently to her seat. Leviathan was typing madly on his D.D.D. laboriously ignoring Asmodeus’ delight.

She couldn’t keep her smile to herself when Lucifer took a sip and uncomfortably cleared his throat. “All better?” she asked sweetly, meeting his narrowed eyes. 

He’d been finding ways to avoid talking about how frequent her near death experiences had become, to the point of ignoring it completely now. They didn’t talk about their night of passion either. If there was nothing to her existence in his eyes besides this game of cat and mouse, then she would walk into his loyalty bound jaws. She was done cowering and waiting. If he wanted to keep playing this stupid game then she would win. 

“Marginally better,” he said.

Looking to her right, she saw the furrow of confusion between Mammon’s brows but he hastily stuffed his face with more spicy shakshouka. Not even her sassing of Lucifer was trumping Mammon’s need for silence; it might take longer for him to crack than she’d anticipated. ‘Wonderful.’ At least he’d brought her the cream and an iced coffee earlier, even if Publedina had been forced to lug it into the kitchen for him. ‘Coward,’ she thought. Never before had she met anyone who’d wantonly kiss her and then run away.

An argument had sparked up around her while she’d gotten lost considering Mammon’s behaviour. It was amazing how easily one of them firing off their mouth catapulted the rest into the fray. She returned to eating and considered her options for creating the peaceful breakfast she wanted.

Looking directly at Asmodeus, she raised her fork and clanged it against her water glass until she had everyone’s attention. “Tell me: If you're going down a river at two ells per hour, and your canoe loses a wheel, how much pancake mix would you need to re-shingle your roof?” She studiously ignored the way Belphegor’s tail was painting butter on the vacated headrest of Lucifer’s chair.

With a pout of consternation, Asmodeus looked between Leviathan and Belphegor for help. 

The entire table fell silent again, glancing at one another and back to her blank expression, before beginning to repeat the question to themselves. She could tell already that this was going to be a good one. Surprising and confusing demons had become her go to sport, and her demons never failed to lose themselves in the ridiculousness she created. 

“What kind of question is that?” Leviathan asked, accidentally squeezing the coloured omelette filling out of his wrap with his intensity. “Canoes don’t have wheels!”

“I only mentioned losing  _ a _ wheel,” she said, not looking up but raising her finger mid-air to pause him, “not wheels.”

Lucifer closed his eyes and pinched at the bridge of his nose, but she saw the hint of his smile, poorly shielded by his gloved hand.

“Some canoes have wheels,” Beelzebub volunteered. “They’re great for portaging.” His words were less discernible after he pushed another serving of egg casserole into his mouth. “Ut I fink vose ount a carts.”

She smiled fondly at him. Even if his attempt at calming Leviathan had failed, at least their argument was lighthearted now.

“Forty-two!” Satan slapped the tabletop to punctuate his confident answer. His eyes danced with merriment when she leaned forward to look at him at his end of the table.

Her fork falling from her fingers, she ducked her head and laughed. “You win this round.” She hadn’t expected him to find an answer to her nonsense question, and certainly not that quickly. "I'll join you after breakfast for reading."

“I’m a Cheshire cat at heart,” Despite his obvious sarcasm, Satan placed both of his hands over his chest where his jacket never seemed to cover.

She gave a small snort of amusement and reached for her water. Alice’s author had been a philosopher; it was no surprise that Satan would reference his work. “Unlikely,” she said, scoffing at him, “a caterpillar at best.”

Leviathan was the only one to catch on to their literary reference. Unfortunately, it was his "LOLOLOLOL!" that was the last straw for Mammon. She rolled her eyes and continued eating as he started in on Satan as to who could or couldn't visit with "his human."

It was almost a peaceful breakfast.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick recap. It's been a tough week. Friday (the 41st day) after RAD until Friday morning (the 48th day) MC has:  
> had a "date" with Beel ending in her trying to fight a waitress  
> had a sleep over with Belphie  
> had some fun with Asmo  
> been comforted by Levi resulting in Lucifer washing her hair  
> learned how to better understand Infernal speech  
> gotten some gaming and reading in with Levi and Satan  
> had smooch sessions with the twins, separately  
> tested her hypothesis with Satan and Mammon,  
> blown off some steam with Asmo  
> fixed her problem with Lucifer  
> had some exceptionally sweet Mammon time  
> walked in on the twins being intimate  
> made chocolates for Levi which ended in the pool incident  
> had Levi put temporary tattoos on her...with his mouth.  
> slept in Lucifer's room (again)  
> had more confusing smooches from Belphie  
> read in Satan's lap  
> \- there was a bubble bath in here somewhere  
> Has a philosophical walk'n'talk with Satan  
> had "lunch" with Beel - followed by jealous sexy times with Belphie (and nearly getting caught by Mammon)  
> \- collected a flying kitten at some point  
> hidden out in Asmo's room from Mammon  
> had to command Mammon to behave  
> undergone a Satanic blood ritual  
> gone clubbing with Mammon and Asmo  
> been kidnapped and tortured  
> escaped and been healed  
> had jealous/comfort sex in the shower with the twins  
> had to put up with Mammon and Belphie fighting  
> had to outrun harada spectres  
> had to learn how to command her demons  
> stayed in Lucifer's room again  
> been dropped off with Levi for safe keeping, but it results in desensitization training  
> had her phone privileges taken away  
> had some Levi and Asmo time with healing and makeovers  
> created some boundaries and begun negotiating her relationship with Levi  
> gone to read with Satan only to run away in a panic  
> taken refuge in Lilith's room only for her ghost to bother her  
> had some sweet time with Asmo and gotten her own messenger spirit  
> mostly made up with Beel and spent the night sleeping soundly between the twins  
> told off Mammon  
> made breakfast while disrobing Beelzebub
> 
> Our girl is getting TIRED!


	101. Not Up to Going Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC just wants everyone to get along and enjoy some quiet time in the house. Reading with Satan should be uneventful, right?
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading of this chapter!

After the protective display at breakfast, she should‘ve expected that Mammon would hover near her, but she hadn't expected him to be close enough to be her shadow, not after he’d kissed her and run earlier.

It wouldn't be a problem if he'd at least talk to her, but the most she got were grunts, sighs, and eye rolls as she walked to the common room with him entow.

A feline trill met her when she opened the door. She ducked just in time to avoid a head on collision with her pantheptera; Mammon was not so lucky.

Concern tempering her laughter, she tried to check on them both. 

Mammon coughed and held his throat, stumbling away from her reaching hands, while the kitten shook her head and her wings beat a mismatched rhythm, wobbling in midair.

Scooping Rancor up from her dazed flapping, she made her way toward Satan who was already reading on the undamaged couch, having stolen her usual seat nearest the fire.

“I was marginally worried that you were going to stand me up,” Satan said, tucking his index finger between the pages of his book.

She plopped down next to him, closer than she usually sat. “I’m only supposed to run when there’s danger,” she said, taking the time to instruct him on the finer points of survival, before reaching across him to collect her book from the arm of the couch.

Nothing more was said as they both opened their books and Rancor continued to get her bearings. 

Flopping backwards onto the legless couch across from them, Mammon rested the bend of his knees over the couch arm, letting his feet dangle. He huffed loudly and pulled out his D.D.D, clearly attempting to out-ignore them.

As time passed, she could hear Mammon becoming more irritable by the frequency of his shifting and how, in her periphery, he now stabbed at the screen of his D.D.D. He was just going to have to sort himself out. These monkeys were hers, but not the circus they put themselves into everyday.

As it was, trouble came to her no matter where she went. The door creaked open and Belphegor walked toward them. 

Marking her place in her book, she gave him slightly more than a polite smile. She’d hoped to have more time to figure out just what they were to one another before she saw him away from the semi-formality Lucifer required at meals. This morning’s Mammon-interruptus, and then breakfast, hadn’t exactly lent itself to pillow talk.

Immediately, Rancor was on alert. She left Satan’s lap to flap and hop her way onto the couch back, spitting and hissing as Belphegor drew near.

Mammon’s amused smile was the only thing that marred the déjà vu. Once again, she felt Satan tense next to her as Rancor became more agitated and yowled.

Resigning herself to being the peacekeeper of the household, she sighed. “Stay put, Belphie.” She set down her book to stand and walk toward him. It was unlikely he’d come to bother his brothers when he could be napping after a meal, which meant he was here for her.

Rancor’s tiny paws moved double speed as she tried to keep up with her human’s stride. 

Squeaky  _ mraow _ s followed her as if she’d abandoned the pantheptera to a cold and desolate frontier, not taken a couple steps across the room. The plaintive squeaks grew more distressed as she moved away from the couch line.

She walked directly in front of her Belphegor and swallowed her discomfort at hugging him in front of Mammon, bringing her arms up around his neck. “See? It’s okay. He’s not going to hurt me,” she said, pivoting their hug to better look at the winged kitten.

Ears still flat to her head, Rancor gave a low yowl and took to the air, flapping above Belphegor as menacingly as a five pound, demonic kitten could.

“Rancor…” she said, her disappointment clear as her shoulders sunk.

Ignoring her attempts to bring the kitten lower, Belphegor loosely brought his arms around her waist. “I’m in charge of dinner tonight. Is there anything you want?”

The way he spoke, so quietly, leaning down to her ear, it filled her with a strange warmth. Ever since he’d started trying to make amends, Belphegor had been thoughtful, but now it felt like something more: an intense sort of caring she wasn’t familiar with.

She let herself snuggle just the smallest bit into the fabric of his cardigan. “Something with vegetables. Other than the cabbage I hid in Levi's wraps this morning, I don’t think he's had any since classes finished.” 

Sneaking a look over at Mammon, as she checked on Rancor’s state of agitation, she found Mammon almost equally as bothered as the cat. He was stabbing his finger upward into his D.D.D. with far more force than before.

“Behave yourself,” she whispered to Belphegor when she felt the ghost of his teeth against her ear. She knew Mammon couldn’t see it, but that was beside the point.

With a disappointed sigh, Belphegor gently turned her back around to face the fireplace and Satan. “As my mistress commands,” he said, draping his body over her shoulders instead. He lazily shooed Rancor away with a wave of his hand when she attempted to dive bomb him. 

Every time he so much as twitched a finger the pantheptera growled. The sound wasn’t easy for a human to decipher, but with the repetition it was growing easier. It reminded her of Little Demon Number Two’s bravado when they’d happened upon one of Stolas’ owl-shaped children with the hungry look in its eyes. It was similar to when Mammon had put himself between her and Lucifer after she’d released Belphegor and bent time, or even the small vibration she'd felt from Leviathan yesterday when he held her away from Beelzebub.

When the same sound rippled over her, spreading out across her back and through her, it was enough to parse. She shut her eyes to concentrate. The difference was that Belphegor was saying it as a question.  _ Defend? _

The savage sound that left Rancor removed any doubt of her kitten’s intentions. 

She locked eyes with Satan and smiled hopefully as the two around her slowly came to an understanding.

“There. We’re practically friends,” Belphegor said, his chin now resting atop her head. He nuzzled his cheek against her hair, mussing it up. “I’ll be back shortly if you’re not interested in a trip to the store.”

She took her time answering, waiting for the last tingles his growls had created to fade away. “I’m not up for going out today,” she said, apologetically stroking the limp arm that hung over her shoulder. Outside didn’t seem safe anymore. Inside the house was only marginally better. 

Without Rancor’s growls as a warning system, she was unprepared for the light squeeze Belphegor gave her. “I have a proposal that I'd like you to entertain,” he said, “when you have some time later.” 

It was difficult not to blush when Belphegor kissed her cheek. Satan's studious gaze hadn’t left her face and she suspected Mammon had already broken his D.D.D. screen. She nodded and Belphegor released her.

Much to her surprise, he left without antagonizing anyone and slipped out of the room just as Leviathan entered through the opposite doors.

Reading was becoming a group activity it seemed. “Levi, have you come to join our reading group?” she asked as she made her way back to the couch, and actively ignored the flicker of purple flames around him.

“Have you seen my Zwitch?”

Ah, that made more sense.

“No, but I haven’t looked either,” she said noncommittally before climbing knees first onto the couch to lay her stomach across Satan’s thighs. He had crept closer to her end of the couch during the growling standoff, leaving plenty of room for her elbows on the other side of him.

“I have no idea what you’re trying here," Satan said, holding his book aloft. “Excuse you.”

“Thank you for excusing me,” she said, looking over her shoulder at him with a cheeky smile. Radiant energy under her stomach buzzed, like mirth and anger in one, a hot wine against her clothed skin. She pushed her luck. “You took my seat after all.”

The laughter above her allowed her to relax, even if the energy beneath her didn’t completely subside, but the sound of Satan’s book closing brought the tension right back to her shoulders quickly.

“I don’t see what you have to be smiling about,” he said, “I’m still angry with you.”

“Still?” she asked, turning partially on her side to better see him. Which thing he was angry about she wasn’t entirely certain.

“Yes, still.”

_ ‘Whump!’  _ The fabric bound book he held was used to swat the backs of her thighs.

She shrieked and rolled to protect the backs of her legs, leaving her belly unguarded. “Satan!” she said, her voice failing to hold much reprimand when she saw how he barely kept his creeping grin at bay. It was the smile he reserved for pranking Lucifer.

Grumbles from Mammon’s couch drew her attention away, but it was ruthlessly drawn back by the slap of the book to the front of her thighs.

A pillow struck Satan in the temple and she cheered, “Power puff burst!” She laughed and lifted her arms above her head to celebrate Leviathan’s victorious smiting. 

“H-Hey, quit it!” Leviathan said, blushing enough for all three of them.

“Sooorry, Levi,” she said, meaning it as she took the pillow that had fallen on her and used it to support her head. She smiled up at Satan sweetly. No beating the human allowed, not with Leviathan present.

“Flashing your blunt teeth won’t save you,” he said, lifting his book back up and ignoring the three others in the room. So quickly, she wasn’t sure if she'd imagined it, the angry flex of Satan’s jaw relaxed back to resting. 

“My teeth may be blunt but they’re not just for smiling, Satan.” She made herself cozy and lifted her book as well.

Leviathan’s huffing filled the air as he rummaged through desk drawers and checked behind decorations now that no one seemed to be actively touching the human. 

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Satan asked, his gaze never wavering from his pages. “Most species bare their teeth as a threat, as a display of aggression or leadership, but yours is a friendly submission, a request for leniency.”

She didn’t like the condescension in his tone; it reminded her too much of Lucifer. While their relationship was usually that of smitten, circling debaters, or more often student and teacher, it didn’t mean she’d let him make her into a mouse. This couldn’t be allowed to become the precedent. If she gave him an inch, he’d take a mile.

Pushing his hands and book out of her way, she sat back up and rearranged herself until she was sitting in his lap. His sour expression started to fade when she tilted her head back to rest on his shoulder, just as they had done the first time she’d read in his lap. Except, this time, she raised her hand to the cheek opposite her to tilt his ear closer to her mouth. 

Her fingers glided down his neck slowly as she whispered, loud enough for only him to hear. “These clenched jaws can and will open your yielding throat. I want you to think of that the next time I smile.”

“You’re playing a dangerous game,” Satan said, his voice low and full of warning. The hand that held his book was draped across her, resting it against her hip.

Dangerous games were required when it came to staying out from under the thumbs of archdemons. “I’m afraid of many things, Satan, sometimes that includes you, but that’s never stopped me before.” Her voice didn’t tremble. She’d been through too much for his weak and unspecific threats to rattle her now. “Continue to treat me well and I’ll do the same for you,” she said, tapping a finger against his hand, “but play with me and I  _ will _ show you how the game is played.”

Just as she felt the tips of Satan’s green claws around her bicep, Leviathan’s warble of indignation broke the tension. Whatever he had said was drowned out by Mammon’s louder complaint.

“Nope, that's it for me. I CAN'T TAKE THIS ANYMORE! Hands off the human!" Mammon shouted.

She blinked, confused to find Mammon’s arms supporting her knees and mid back. The crackle of electricity between the pointed hooks of his wingtips caught her attention and she brought a hand up to rest against his sternum. “Hey, everything’s okay. We’re all okay.”

“You’re sitting on this couch now,” he said as he set her down as far from Satan as possible. “No more lovey-doveyness or  _ claws _ .” The last part he said as he sat himself directly next to her, his eyes focused, cold and hard, on the Avatar of Wrath.

The room was silent and she could feel Leviathan’s focus on her, even as he sat down across from her with his game device in both hands, eyes glued to it. 

She must’ve already read the same paragraph twenty times, but she cracked her book open once more, intent on letting the energy in the room dissipate. It wasn’t long before the comforting pops and hisses of the fireplace lulled her back to a sense of calm. They were far too practiced at pretending nothing had happened, sweeping uncomfortable tensions under the rug for another day.

With the lazy way Mammon’s arm wrapped around the back of the couch, just shy of touching her, she could tell he had relaxed too, even if he was still transformed. There was an ease with which he rested his shoe over his other leg, bumping her with his knee, and his D.D.D. screen was no longer in danger of being jabbed into a million pieces every time he tried to click on something.

“ _ Pfft _ . You would like ‘Purple People Eater,’” Leviathan said, with a dismissive snort.

Satan sighed heavily and put down his book, completely ignoring it in favour of watching something he obviously expected to unfold.

It took a few seconds for her to understand and she squinted at Leviathan. She hadn’t realized she’d been humming. “Wait, you know it? But it’s a human song.”

Zwitch still in both hands he outright laughed at her. “You’re looking at the undisputed Sovereign of Song.”

“No one calls him that,” Mammon said. “No one calls you that!”

“Yo... That hit me right in the feels, Mammon. Right in the feels." His goofy laughter belied his serious words.

She looked back and forth between the two of them before she started humming again, her eyes trained on Leviathan. 

“Baby Got Back. Good try, Normie, but not good enough.” His hands never stopped dancing over the controls of his Zwitch. 

“Imagine me and you, I do,” she said, singing the words softly as she tilted her head, studying the TSL champion she’d defeated. “I think about you day and night, it’s only right...” She watched him fidget before he broke and took the bait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey folks!  
> I'm still going to try and post on Monday morning, but I'm getting eye surgery in a few hours so we'll see how real life goes!


	102. Friendly Competition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Number 1 TSL Fan and the Human go head to head for round two!
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to Elvishdork and Sarchopathic for their encouragement and editing suggestions

“Happy together by the Turtles,” Leviathan said, still not looking up, but her romance based song choices were clearly affecting him if the way he cursed about a missed set of bonus points was anything to go by.

Her search for another song to stump him broke off as what appeared to be a large, orange and black bumblebee wended its way lazily through the room. She leaned away, into the couch, the back of her neck brushing against Mammon’s arm as the football sized creature approached.

Before she could ask, Publedina intercepted it, matching its zigzag patterns at every turn until they both hovered in place. She had no idea what the standoff was about, but she relaxed when she saw Mammon shake his head at the aerial ballet that was taking place. 

After a brief battle of soft light pulses, she watched as the bee exposed its back legs and the small item it held in them. As soon as Publedina snatched it up into her chubby mitts their visitor flew away. They reminded her of the floating speakers at The Fall that had swayed and pulsed with the music. She considered the possibilities, and dangers of attempting to remake something like that as Publedina dropped a tiny note into her lap.

Unfolding it, she read the tidy, unsmudged script, and found herself blushing. The contents weren’t scandalous in any way, just an invitation to join Beelzebub at Restaurante Ninurita the evening after Diavolo’s party. It was no different than any other time they’d gone restraunting, but remembering him practically shirtless in the kitchen this morning brought a heat to her cheeks that crept down her neck.

“Hey,” Mammon asked. “What’s got you all red?”

“Nothin’,” she said as she moved to stuff the note into her pocket. 

He caught her wrist, staring at the note suspiciously, and without further thought she leaned forward and stuffed the square of paper in her mouth, making a show of chewing it.

Satan rolled his eyes with enough effort that she thought they might fall out. Only Leviathan appeared uninterested in her note.

With his body half over hers, Mammon pushed her back into the couch cushions to secure the note. “Ah! Whaddya think you’re doin’? That could be cursed or poisoned!” His hands squished her cheeks, trying to get her to open her mouth.

It was probably wrong of her to enjoy him over her like this, but she could keep it to a platonic tussle; she exaggerated a swallow and smiled up at him victoriously.

“Ugh! Humans and their secrets.” Mammon said, grousing as he pulled away and returned to his seat, not that he let her go for long. Pulling her with him, she was returned to his side so that they were hip to hip again. 

She could feel the way he was breathing harder than he should. He was huffy and just a little bit pink after realizing what they must’ve looked like.

When Mammon looked away in irritation, she took the opportunity to turn her head in the opposite direction, spitting out the still very dry note card into her hand where he couldn’t see. “Satan?” she said, her call delighted and full of mischief. She opened her hand and winked. “Light it up.”

It was impossible to hold in her less than lady-like laughter as Mammon pulled her into his lap, presumably away from the flash of green light he’d seen. Satan lighting anything up on the fly was rarely a safe event.

“What? But you swallowed it! When did you?” He was patting down her sides, and prodding her ribs as if her stomach might relinquish the secret of the digested note.

She laughed harder, her stomach and cheeks hurting, before trying and failing to get it together by turning to hide her face in Mammon’s shoulder.

“Ooooh. Normie got you good,” Leviathan said, already typing away.

“Shaddup! I let her have it, is all.”

Satan’s grin was wide. It seemed her earlier trespass was already forgiven for the small price of including him in her prank on Mammon.

“Normie Roasts StupidMammon. LOL! Beaten at sleight of hand by a human.”

“Levi...” she said. He knew how she felt about calling Mammon names.

“And SENT!”

She sighed in defeat, but took enjoyment from the way Mammon relaxed under her. They were less than stellar at the moment, especially if he was only just now realizing that she was still willing to defend him the way she always had. At least he’d realized it.

“Publedina,” she said, drawing the spirit back to her from its wanderings on the ceiling. It seemed no matter how whispered her words, the spirit could always hear her, and she was glad for it.

The mal'akh zipped through the air, dodging Rancor as she attempted to bat at it. Now hovering safely ahead at eye height, the wombat waited patiently for the human to get out a message card of her own.

“Come closer,” she said, crooking her finger. She could see Leviathan raising his eyes up from his screen with a look of concern when she asked, “Can you deliver sound?”

Mammon grabbed her upper arms, about to move her away, but it was too late, the little wombat had already headbutted her.

Her eyes now closed, she was happy that she hadn’t wavered much, not that Mammon’s grip would have let her fall. Certainly not what she had expected, the tap to her forehead felt as though her messenger had phased partly into her skull. 

Slowly, she opened her eyes as Publedina pulled away. The insides of her ears were warm and the back of her throat cold, as a pressurized suction pulled at both of them, trying to phase them out of her along with the furry ball of energy.

The sensation passed quickly, and when she fixed her eyes on Leviathan, ripples of music began to vibrate out of the little, brown wombat, first quietly and then louder. She focused, with difficulty at first, opening and closing her eyes against Satan’s dissecting stare. Eventually, she stood up, having trouble clearing her head with the heat of Mammon’s hands so tight around her bare arms. 

When she stumbled as she stepped away from him, she lost her concentration and the melody she’d made appear in the room became too soft to hear. It wouldn’t stop her. This wasn’t her magic, but it was still magic and she’d take what she could get.

Thankfully, self-consciousness didn’t haunt her here the way it had in her old life. Her stumble and the falter of the music didn’t hurt her pride. She was free to fail without any real judgement in the Devildom. There was still a certain level of decorum that was required by Lucifer, but everything else was fair game for her to muddle through. 

Showing her frustration, excitement, or delight, it only seemed to draw her demons closer, and except when feeling snippy, there was little need to hide her feelings from them. If anything, she suspected that Satan was pleased to watch the stumbling blocks of her newest experiment.

She took a deep breath. The worst that could happen is that Leviathan would tease her or maybe Satan would offer her information about the evolution of musics. Mammon would tease her no matter the outcome.

Tentatively, she began to hum what she thought should have existed. The sound emanating from Publedina matched her intensity of volume, and gradually her excitement outgrew her uncertainty. 

“Sing once again with me,” she sang, her voice dipping low, “our strange duet.” The organ music began to pulse out of Publedina, who now bobbed in sync with the rhythm close to the ceiling. 

She stretched out her hand toward Satan, before curling her fingers back into a fist, trying to hide the hint of bashfulness that didn’t quite disappear with the mischievous raise of her eyebrows. “My power over you, grows stronger yet.”

“The Phantom of the Opera?” Satan asked, his interest clear when he set his book aside completely.

She gave a small laugh. “Of course you’d be a theatre kid. One point for Satan!”

The way he scrunched his nose distastefully at her exclamation made her laugh again. She should have known; Lucifer loved theatre.

“H-hey! You didn’t say it was a competition!” Leviathan said, standing up and crossing his arms to give a sour look to her point winner. “Besides, you don’t have the timber for that part.”

“What was that?” she asked, leaning forward, cupping her hand to her ear; her smile was taunting. “Are you afraid I’ll beat you again?” At his straightening figure she grinned. “Let’s see just how many human songs you know.”

For once Leviathan wasn’t shrinking in on himself, and like with the TSL competition, she watched him inflate with confidence. His Zwitch lay completely forgotten on the couch armrest.

She closed her eyes and tried to remember the rise and fall of a violin. “I will run, I will climb, I will soar,” she sang, encouraging her memory of the song to flood the room with an accompanying piano. “I'm undefeated, ooh.” Opening her eyes, she was surprised to see Leviathan standing closer, now next to the coffee table and studying her, possibly more intensely even than Satan. “Jumping out of my skin, pull the chord.” The song rose and fell like a breeze. “Yeah I believe it, ooh.”

Leviathan began to mouth the next passage, and she fell silent, the accompanying piano becoming muted as she did. It didn’t stop him from growing louder. “The past is everything we were. Don't make us who we are.”

Carefully, hiding her glee, she coughed into her hand. “I started you off with easy ones,” she said. 

“Enough talk, Normie. Let’s see what you can conjure up that might be worth my time.” Now that his worry about her incompatible meatshell was shown to be unfounded he was clearly ready to throw down.

Her mouth dropped open and for a brief moment the image of him dressed in yesterday’s makeover flashed in her mind. Publedina’s loud static overhead spurred her back into gear, almost startling her away from the safety of the couch at her side.

A drum beat softly through the room, reminding her of nights in tents and the heat of campfires. “And all that night,” she began to chant, “through every tent, she stalked and slaughtered as she went,” Her voice was hushed with a word for every beat, like a sinister lullaby. “When the sun raised up his head, half of all that tribe lay dead.”

Leviathan wasn’t phased by the lyrics, only the sharpness of his teeth in his confident smile indicated any change that might exist . “Hair like snow, eyes that gleam,” he continued chanting in sync with her, “things aren't always what they seem.”

Keeping beat with her hand against her thigh, she discontinued singing and let the beat overhead die out with Leviathan’s final refrain.

He raised his hands and wriggled his now clawed fingers at her with fake menace “Teeth too long, hands too thin—Always look beneath the skin!”.

Her excitement was likely lost on Leviathan, but she could tell at a glance that Satan could see right through her. This was a pastime she’d never thought to revive here and it might actually rival Leviathan’s love of Ruri-chan for her.

Closing her eyes against Satan’s scrutiny, a soft hum filled the air above her followed by the rhythmic thump of the butt of a walking stick against the ground: dry earth littered with leaves and twigs snapped with each strike. She could already hear the path ahead of her, where the song would lead her along long forgotten ridgelines made of sandstone.

“Ahhh no fair! That one’s too specific! You’re dipping into small groups I never would’ve met!” Leviathan said.

“Fiiiiiine,” she said, opening her eyes with a grogginess she hadn’t expected from the interruption, “You seemed to recognize it just fine, but I don’t have to stick to English then.”

“I thought you only speak English?” Mammon asked, from the couch behind her. He’d scooted to the edge nearest her, confusion written all over his face.

She tried not to laugh at the picture he offered her, with no outlet for his excess energy, he seemed ready to move at any moment. His knees, much too high with the legs of the couch snapped out from beneath it, jiggled nervously.

“English is the only one I _speak_. That doesn’t mean I can’t recognize or enjoy other languages and their music,” she said. “The emotion behind it is always understandable, even if it’s not alike enough for me to get the gist of.”

“What do I get if I win?” Leviathan asked, cutting in without remorse.

“What do you want?” she asked immediately, falling back into their exchange of rapid fire questions.

He choked on his words for a moment before he broke eye contact with her. “You have to go to Ruri-land with me for my birthday.”

“I’m already going to do that,” she said, shaking her head. “Pick again.”

“Well...uhm…A-A...a favour to be redeemed at a later time.” He seemed chuffed to have found and pronounced a solution so quickly.

“Deal!”

“Oi! Don’t be just givin’ away favours to demons without knowing what they are!” Mammon got to his feet. “His favour could be eatin’ your soul!”

“You’re on!” Leviathan said, pumping his fist in the air.

She watched Mammon drop his face into his palm, shaking his head. 

“Oh shush, he’s not going to eat my soul. He’d have to find a new Henry,” she said, before taking in Mammon’s surprise at her rationale. “Sit back down if you’re not going to compete.” She shooed him away with both hands and a smile.

“Who was it who undid the nine witch knots / Braided in amongst this lady's locks?” she sang. Only a flute accompanied her, spare but clear. “And who was it who the leather shoe untied / From the left foot of his wedded bride?"

"And who was it split the silken thread,” Leviathan sang without batting an eyelash, “the spider stretched all beneath this lady's bed?” Where he usually put too much energy into singing anisongs, his passion outweighing the importance of the notes, with this he didn’t miss a note.

She pursed her lips. Newer songs were clearly the route to a win; Leviathan hadn’t been to the human world much in the last few centuries after all.

Softly, the sound of waves began to lap overhead, and she flicked her hand at her side as if trying to speed through the tracks in her mind. The Spanish guitar set the tone before the cumbia rhythm kicked in; the baseline made her itch to move with it. 

The echo of voices introducing the song within the swell of music was enough for Leviathan to guess even before she’d begun to sing. “You can’t win by embarrassing me,” he said, his eyes narrowed just before she opened her mouth to sing the first notes.

She frowned at the new rule but shrugged and launched into the next one that came to mind. Once more she changed tempo, using her hands to pat or click at different rates, tapping her heels against the floor in syncopation to create a back beat. Faster for each new song, the music fell in with the movements she made. 

Each song was cut short by Leviathan’s speedy answers but she wasn’t ready to give up on the old game she’d resurrected from her childhood. She used her movements to keep her focused.

This time there was no vocalization, only the way her body shifted while she closed her eyes and the sound that fell down from Publedina added to her sway. The electric guitar was repetitive as her body began to shake.

With her eyes closed, she didn’t know how Mammon looked torn between apprehension and want, or see Satan’s focused perplexity at the heavy metal guitar riff. Instead, she concentrated solely on keeping the sound going, running the isolation of muscles up and down her body, undulating, and circling her hands softly in the air beside her hips. This song wasn’t remembered, it had to be felt. They hadn’t guessed yet and she continued, opening her eyes as the second guitar hit and her movements became sharper, her hands now alternating their rotations between shoulder and hip height. 

Leviathan’s eyes nearly popped out of his head when she shifted her weight to the ball of her foot, only to drop her raised hip and heel back down after. Repeating the motion on each side, she continued to create intricate patterns of movement with the sway of her hips. 

“The sound of the drums,” she whispered and dropped her hands dramatically as the rasp of a man’s voice covered hers, both barely heard over the crash of the drums that joined in. She continued the small abdominal isolations as she shifted her weight and circled Leviathan.

When she thrust her breasts forward and up, she nearly lost focus, concerned by how pale he had suddenly become. Stretching out her arms, she moved them sinuously. Belly dancing was not something she had seen any of the brothers attempt before; it never came up during RAD’s dance curriculum either. Hopefully, it would be enough to stump Leviathan.

Returning to where she’d started, she watched as his mouth fell open when she leaned to the side. The drums were demanding, pounding far louder than they should be, but she moved slowly, sinuously stretching back until she could see Mammon and Satan behind her. Just as slowly, her hands still rising and falling like soft waves to the beat, she continued to pull her upper body around the axis of her hips until she’d returned to the same low stretch on the opposite side.

“I didn’t know there was a more metal version of Thunderstruck!” Satan shouted over the dinn.

She dropped a knee to the ground and sat back on the floor, straightening her upper body as her lower half hinged in on itself. The music faded away and she laughed at Satan’s surprised expression. 

“That’s not fair,” Leviathan said, his tail flicking behind him. “I didn’t know we were doing covers. And—And your dancing wasn’t supposed to…”

“Ahh!” Mammon said, from behind her. 

_“I am flesh and I am bone”_ whispered so quietly from Publedina above that she didn’t hear it. She was too busy watching Mammon pointing at Leviathan as he helped her upright with his hand cupping her bent elbow. 

“You’re a demon and ya made a deal.” Mammon said, and swept imaginary dust away from her hip and down her thigh. “No complainin’ when you didn’t bother ta set the rules up.”

_Arise, ting ting, like glitter and gold._

She smiled up at him and ruffled his hair. His shocked expression and flushed face was something she would love to dwell on, but right now she’d recovered a piece of something she thought she’d lost. Without a word she let him leave her side to scurry away and sit down heavily on the broken couch.

_I've got fire in my soul..._

Despite being unable to look her in the eye any longer, with each new beat she chose Leviathan named or had the following lyric to match. She bit her thumb when the right song wouldn’t come to her, and then a synthetic beat thumped overhead when she was unable to wipe away the last rhythm from her mind enough to hear the words of the one she wanted. It felt like the sound was zig zagging from side to side on the ceiling above. “Come bite my thumb! I hope you know the stakes” she said, mostly to herself. “I'll put a slug between your shoulder blades. Then ask what light through yonder poser breaks?” It wasn’t what she’d been attempting to remember, but she continued anyway waiting for the tug of eureka. She held out her hands, counting out the meter on her fingers. “I hath been iambic on that ass, ye bastard…”

Satan was looking at her like she’d grown a second head.

Her fingers twitched and wiggled, trying to speed through her memory once more. “Ye hoebag! You're an old white Soulja Boy who has no swag,” Finally, she looked up again to find Leviathan scowling, clearly wracking his brain at least as hard as she was. “And no gonads. Egads, it's so sad!” She waved her hand, dismissing the old beat just as she saw a moment of understanding strike Satan. 

“Shakespeare?” Satan asked, mouthing the question while obviously trying not to look flabbergasted.

With a shriek, she felt herself lifted in the air and twirled. She laughed and the rhythm completely shifted into something playful and lewd. “I'm a monster for these cookies! I'm a beast for they treats!” she shouted, as Asmodeus rocked her body in the midst of setting her down.

The delight on his face matched hers as he sang along, picking up where her laughter made her unintelligible. He grabbed her hips and dropped low with her. “An animal for they cracker / Head to feet they so damn sweet / Can't keep my hands, my hands, my ha uh!” His hands slid over the curves of her body, rolling and grinding her against him as he brought them back up.

“Gym Class Heroes!” Leviathan shouted, purple energy erupting brightly enough from his hands that it was visible despite how he had tucked them into each of his opposite sleeves in front of him. “Don’t think you’re going to win just by picking songs that make me uncomfortable!”

Mammon loudly answering his phone cut off any reply. “Yo! Make it quick.” 

Clearly, they were still all on edge if Mammon picking up a call was enough to silence the room. 

The quiet static overhead was short lived: Satan cut in, stealing her away from Asmodeus, to whirl slowly around the room with her to the Spring Waltz.

“What do you mean he kicked the cornerstone out of the building?” Mammon asked. He sounded more than a little annoyed. “Well you’ll have to go get him.” He hung up abruptly, only for it to ring again immediately. As the one sided conversation dragged on Mammon’s expression grew foul. “Fine, fine. Just ask her yourself.” He held the D.D.D. horizontal and jabbed the speakerphone.

Music flicked through the room, layer upon layer creating an indecipherable clamour.

“Mammon, just answer the question,” Beelzebub’s voice boomed out of the speaker.

An exuberant _“Cake by the ocean”_ was pumped out by Publedina immediately after.

“Ah, nope, everyone’s fine here. We’re just having a sing-a-long,” Mammon said, scowling at the ceiling. “Good luck with that.” ‘ _Click!_ ’

The sound returned to static with her confusion and Satan promenaded their human back to the couches.

Mammon’s D.D.D. rang again and he answered it without looking, clearly chafed by the constant interruptions, or perhaps the caller. “Whaddya want?” Mammon asked. He leaned his ear away from the device and grimaced. “Hold on,” he muttered before passing it to her abruptly.

“Hell—?”

“Where are you?” Belphegor asked angrily, breathing heavily into the receiver.

_Rude boy!_

“ **Don’t** take that tone with me Belphegor.”

There was a silence on the other end of the line for a moment before he spoke again. “I’m sorry,” he said, clearly trying to soften the sharpness of his frustration. “I just need to know where you are, that you’re safe.”

A wonky melody whispered overhead, creaking forward like a rusted jack-in-the-box crank. _Let me be your freak show, I could be your favorite monster…_

She looked up at Publedina like a fire alarm that needed to have the smoke batted away from it. “Shush you!”

_Rattle my whole cage, remind me why I can't be fostered_

“Hey!” Belphegor said loudly enough for the others to hear and she jerked the device away from her ear. “Are you ignoring me?”

“If you shout at me again I’m hanging up,” she said. “I was just trying to turn the music down so I could hear you properly.” 

“Please,” he asked, his words strained, “tell me?”

Publidina’s sound became a low buzz to match the decibel of Belphegor’s voice in her ear.

_Feelings, sensations that you thought was dead,_

_No squealing and remember that it's all in your head_

“We’re at home, in the common room. Why? What’s wrong?”

_Stop, drop, And drag me into place..._

“And no one is falling asleep? Nothing strange or unexplained happening?”

_...And lock the fire escapes. I'll break your pretty face_

“Nooo?” she asked. “Should there be?” 

_Oh, you clever little thing. What a precious basket case_

“No, I just thought—Nevermind. Promise everything is fine?”

_Now shut your dirty mouth. If I could burn this town_

“Yeah, I promise.” She waited but he didn’t say anything else, and the soft buzzing above was now loud in her head instead. “Did you want a hand with supper later?”

_I wouldn't hesitate To smile while you suffocate_

She didn’t get to hear Belphegor’s reply as Mammon’s hand engulfed hers and the mangled tune and static above them stopped, replaced by a high pitched tone. Looking up, she watched as Publedina pulsed like one of the light-speakers from The Fall, bobbing and weaving to an invisible song: frenetic and uncontrolled.

“Alright, I’ve gotta get back.” Leviathan said, his sulking deep enough that she was surprised he hadn’t already left. “I have a raid starting soon.” 

“I’ll tell you a secret if you can guess the next nine correctly,” she said, flashing him a smile. She wasn’t ready to give this up yet. She needed this.

_I’m only human. I’m only human after all._


	103. Open Secret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sing-a-long comes to a close and MC and Mammon have the beginnings of a heart to heart.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to Elvishdork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading <3

“You’re on.” Leviathan’s blush had finally died down and now she was working on coaxing him out of his surliness. “Make it quick.” 

Whether his mood was due to Belphegor’s tone, or her for ignoring him for the call, she wasn’t sure. 

Korean pop music filled the room, and she motioned her hands from side to side, miming specific dance moves that she hoped he’d pick up quickly. “이젠 정말 널 모르겠어.” She rock stepped and turned in a way she knew would make him think of the Sucre Frenzy choreography that he’d drilled into her for days at a time. “어쩔 땐 연인 같다” Her smile was wide when she finished the first stanza. “어느 순간 친구로 변신”1

“Idiot!” Leviathan shouted, crowing it triumphantly, his fist pumping in the air.

She laughed and caught Asmodues around the waist on his way to thump Leviathan for his perceived slight. “Correct!” she said.

Her next words were tenderly crooned to the gentle rise and fall of softened piano notes. She rocked back and forth with Asmodeus, who was settling down more quickly than she’d expected. 

“La mer,” Leviathan croaked out, looking away from her uncomfortably as Asmodeus’ shifting hand brought her closer and into a more intimate embrace.

A ringing sound between them broke her concentration and she pushed away just enough to get to the front pocket of her dress.

“Oh, Darling, all you had to say was that you wanted me. You don’t need to reach,” Asmodeus said, the words purred against her neck as he reeled her back in.

After a quick glance at the caller ID, she laughed at his antics and broke away from him, ducking behind Satan and the couch to answer her D.D.D. “City morgue: You stab ‘em we slab ‘em. How can I help you?” There was no point in further conversation; Lucifer was definitely calling to test her again, or invite her to her own punishment for the infraction of texting him this morning. 

Already halfway over the couch, Mammon nearly had her D.D.D. in his grasp when she hung up. He lowered his outstretched hand in confusion at her bright smile and the sudden end to the call. 

Passing the device to him, she let him look at the screen.

_You can stand me up at the gates of hell But I won't back down…_

“Duke of Disdain?” he asked, louder than necessary, before trailing off into a nearly indiscernible grumble. “You know you’re not supposed to be answering at all until you get the all clear...”

The belly-laugh that Satan let out was quickly chorused by Leviathan. She wisely ignored Leviathan’s adorable snort and Asmodeus was, thankfully, unable to catch his breath to mock him.

About to return to her place in front of Leviathan and complete the challenge, she wasn’t prepared for Satan when he pulled her close for himself. Her eyes slid shut at the barely there current of energy that washed through her. Staying there, seemed like an excellent idea. The hum of his magic wasn’t prickling her, instead it was warming her skin. It almost felt like his laughter sounded, a weak dizziness that she liked.

Leviathan’s shouts of “Or3o’s ‘All Eyes on Me’” and “Vindicated” were nearly lost on her. She stepped away to clear her head.

Always eager for attention, Asmodeus stole her back as soon as she left the circle of Satan’s arms. She twirled around the room to a samba beat, Asmodeus flourishing her body in front of Mammon like he’d found a new cape, until Leviathan finally called out “ Échame La Culpa.” 

“Lift me up!” Leviathan said quickly, his eyes now following her every movement, searching for clues from her stance or expression, no longer just from the instruments’ notes. “East Side,” he said, just as she pinched Asmodeus’ cheek and extricated herself, using the slower beat to her advantage.

Having enough of being manhandled she moved closer to Leviathan and wasn’t disappointed when his tail flicked out and cracked in the air next to Asmodeus’ reaching hand. Classical choral music flooded the room: slow building tension with men’s sharp voices that slid into sweeter female pitches. They joined together in the foreboding march, and for a moment all of her demons seemed confused at her choice. 

It didn’t last long. “Vapautettu kuningatar,” Leviathan said with confidence.

If her smile was any broader it would’ve cracked her face. Her hands did a poor job of covering her dopey expression; she was glad to now be side by side with Leviathan, so that he couldn’t see how excited she was. It had been so long since she’d sung, even longer since she’d had anyone to sing with her.

“The Captured Queen?” Mammon asked. He seemed genuinely curious, sitting up straighter on the back of the couch he’d chosen to return lounging on. 

“Liberated Queen in English,” Satan corrected quickly, looking to her for confirmation. 

Even if it wasn’t _her_ magic in use, this was taking more out of her than expected. She nodded her affirmation before stepping back to lean against the far wall. 

_...Tule päivän valkeuteen nyt, jo mennyt on pitkä yö!_

Just one more song and Leviathan’s answer to her open secret would be complete, then she could rest. If only Asmodeus would stop looking at her like he’d discovered something else. He looked too devious and pleased with himself for her comfort.

“I know you've been hurt,” she whispered, letting the music and the stronger voice she remembered override her own sound. “By someone else.” The soulful voice above crooned, taking attention away from her and drawing it upward to Publedina. “I can tell by the way You carry yourself.” Closing her eyes meant she wouldn’t accidentally look at Mammon; the last thing he needed was pressure from her. “But if you'll let me Here's what I'll do.”

“I’ll take care of you!” Leviathan shouted, immediately breaking her concentration on the song. “I got them all. What‘s the secret?”

Shaking off her Mammon blues, her stupid smile returned and she pushed off the wall. “I’ve already given you the answer!”

Satan scoffed. “Really?”

“Shush you!” she said, shooting Satan a playful glare while ignoring Leviathan’s pouting. She ignored them all and beckoned Publedina down from the ceiling. Best to quit while she was ahead and take a rest before playing with magic went sideways for her as it usually did. Gracchus still hadn’t fully forgiven her for getting his pant leg cemented to the wall when she’d tried to animate the classroom’s chalk brush. 

Hovering at her eye level, Publedina bobbed in place, echoing bits of sound at her. _Backe, backe Kuchen, Der Bäcker hat gerufen. Wer will guten Kuchen backen 2_, drifted to her and she jerked her head back, eyes wide before trying to quickly gather her messenger closer to smother herself in ethereal wombat belly.

Publedina extended claw-tipped paws around her face and into her temples

It felt as if she'd put a back-massager to the base of her skull and she scrunched up her face at the strange invasion. Stumbling back when released from the tingling exchange, she met Mammon's hands instead of the floor; he steadied her as she dumbly waved goodbye to her new boombox.

"Well, I think we've once again failed at reading," she said, suddenly feeling very tired.

"You'll have to join me after supper then," Satan said, eying her drooping form.

It was tempting to lean back and continue resting against Mammon, but she pulled herself up straight. "I'd like that.” 

"Then it's a date."

She could feel Mammon bristle behind her. "It's a set phrase," she reminded him, patting one of the hands he still hadn't removed from her arms. "Anyway, I think I'm going to go take a lay down."

"You sure you’re alright there?" Mammon asked, when her hand remained over his and she didn’t move.

"Yeah," she said, touching her temple with her free hand. "Just tired."

"I can tuck you in." Asmodeus raised his eyebrows suggestively.

She knew he would put her to bed as promised, despite the way he was looking at her, but Mammon’s hold on her didn’t feel like it was going anywhere without a fight. 

"C'mon, human," Mammon said, steering her away from Asmodeus and toward the door, "You've had a rough couple of days for somethin’ so squishy. It's not surprisin' you need more rest."

* * *

“Mammon, you don’t have to carry me. I _can_ walk to my room just fine.

“Quit your whinin’ and bask in what an honour it is to have the Great Mammon helpin’ ya.”

She grumbled into his shoulder. “Why are you so hot and cold? You're impossible.”

There was no answer to her question as Mammon chose to shift her weight into one arm while he opened her door instead.

“Am I tuckin’ you in?” he asked, standing awkwardly out in the hall with her.

“If I say yes, will you join me?”

“Not a chance,” he said. “Got too much ta do. Money to make!”

She could hear how hollow his boisterousness was. The uncomfortable way he shifted his weight afterwards confirmed it for her. “Please?” she asked quietly. “I miss you.”

His frame went rigid around her, but he recovered quickly and stepped over the threshold. “Why ya gotta be so needy, hmm?” he asked and kicked the door closed behind them.

The bedsheets were still rumpled from when Beelzebub had collected her from her nightmares the night before, but Mammon didn’t comment on it. He set her down carefully on the corner of the large bed, before he moved to collect a chair. After pulling it up to the bedside, he shucked his jacket and hung it on the back.

Sitting to remove his boots, he didn’t have his eyes on her, and she easily swatted his hands away. “Gimme that,” she said, grabbing the boot and his calf to wiggle it loose.

“Oi, whaddya think you’re doin’?”

“Taking off the boots of my second laziest demon,” she said without pause. She smiled to herself as she pulled off the first and tugged his other leg up by the pant leg to work on the second boot. “It’s amazing that any of you know how to shoe yourselves given how often I have to help fix your uniforms in the morning.”

“Yeah, well, you shouldn’t be fixin’ anyone’s uniforms,” he said, grimacing as he watched her work. “They’re old enough to be your hundredth great gran-daddies. You don’t need to be babyin’ ‘em.”

She dropped the second boot to the floor before she leaned forward to trace her finger along the collar of his shirt. “Does that mean you want me to stop straightening your tie in the morning?”

“Don’t be puttin’ words in my mouth,” he said and looked away from her. A light blush was already colouring his cheeks. 

Kicking off her slippers, she pulled the covers further back and scooted under them, patting the mattress next to her as she continued to hold the covers up.

“I’m good right here,” Mammon said. He brought his feet up to rest on the bed, much like Lucifer had while she was sick. “Get comfortable and rest up. Those idiots’ll be back before you know it to wake you up with their jabberin’.”

Tired of going in circles with him, she lay back onto her pillows and dropped the covers. “Do you want to know a secret?” she asked.

He was kneeling on the bed next to her before she could finish exhaling.

“What kinda secret?” he asked. His tone was suspicious, but his eyes betrayed his excitement for something just for him.

“Hmm, I dunno,” she said, drawing her eyes up and away from him. “This kind of secret is only for demons who like to cuddle their humans.” She couldn’t fight the smile that was threatening to take over her.

“Like the Great Mammon would fall for something as simple as that,” he said. It didn’t stop him from sidling up to her, his arm stretching over her waist to keep her hemmed in.

‘Baby steps,’ she thought. His arm hovered over her despite his hand touching down on the mattress, but it was a start. She rolled towards him, forcing his hand to lift as her middle nudged his forearm. “It's a secret about Lucifer,” she said, and brought her index finger to her mouth in the universal motion for secrecy.

“That's a good human,” he said, settling his hand against the small of her back, attempting to draw her into his web. “Tell Mammon aaalll about it.”

It was obvious he was itching for blackmail material, but she didn’t care if it meant he wasn’t running away from her for just a few moments. “It’s not very useful,” she said, her excitement fading as she realized this amounted to trickery for affection. 

“Ah-ah, no backing out now.” His fingers tapped impatiently over her lumbar.

“When no one is watching,” she said, whispering it as he moved closer. “Lucifer is a huge snuggler.”

“UGH,” Mammon said loudly and rolled on to his back. “That's all ya got? Ya gotta do WAY better! Even _I_ know that!"

“Oh, really?” She couldn’t help but laugh. “And how does the Great Mammon know about Lucifer’s snuggling habits? Hmm?”

He sputtered over his words and rolled away from her.

“You’re not going anywhere,” she said, nabbing his shirt. Showing her his back only gave her more to hold on to and she tossed an arm and a leg around him. “You’re stuck now!”

“Gah!” Mammon’s limbs flailed for a moment then went limp. “Quit koala-ing me!”

“Never!” she said, her voice high with amusement before she blew a loud raspberry against his neck.

His arms flailed again and this time his legs kicked at her sheets, until they both collapsed in tired laughter.

“So,” she said, finally breaking the comfortable silence once they could both breathe again, “has Lucifer always been bossy in his sleep?”

“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about,” Mammon said, but she could hear the smile he had; it softened his words.

She squeezed him, enjoying him as a little spoon for once. “I really did miss you, you know.” The way his ribcage froze under her arm didn’t go unnoticed.

“Sure. I mean, that makes sense. There’re seven of us, but I'm the only one that really matters.” His breath was shaky as she nuzzled into the back of his neck.

“Don’t run away from me anymore, okay?” she asked. She hadn’t meant to let how vulnerable she felt colour her words so obviously. It sounded like she was a child afraid of the dark, or rather what was in the dark with her.

He patted her hand and then held it. “You’ve got plenty’a other demons willin’ to keep an eye on ya. You don’t need me all the time.”

“But I want you,” she whispered, barely moving the small hairs at his nape. She felt a flush of hot and cold over her skin, the hint of sweat that tried to cover her as she waited.

“I can’t,” he said, the words coming out as a gruff cough. “You’ll get hurt again. You can’t want me.”

“Who would you have take care of me then?” she asked slowly, carefully avoiding any inflection.

“Well, there’s…” He faltered his start a few times, before he finally got it out. “Asmodeus.”

“Asmodeus,” she asked, “the demon who regularly feels me up until you have to remove him?” 

“He’s never lost his temper with you…” 

She could tell from Mammon’s mumbling that even he thought that was a weak argument. “Uh-huh. Pass. He’s way too busy to remember I’m in the same realm some days.”

“Satan would have more time, and you like lookin’ at smelly, old books with him.”

“Mammon,” she said, her voice low, “you pulled me out of his lap less than an hour ago when he tried to make me into his personal pincushion...what’s so horrible about being my demon?” She closed her eyes. Could he feel how her heartbeat nearly moved her whole body? 

“Are you—?” His words pinched off, nearly squeaking before he cleared his throat. The dark schadenfreude in his question was part shock and part delight. “Are you being _greedy_?”

“No!” she said quickly and released her hold on him. 

She didn’t get far: he caught her hand, and held her in place while he turned over, bringing them nose to nose. “I think you are,” he said.

The warmth of his breath fanning over her mouth told her how close he really was, but she didn’t open her eyes, refusing to give him the satisfaction. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, I think you know _exactly_ what I’m talkin’ about,” he said, lifting her up and ignoring her squeak of indignation as he rolled to lay flat on his back and pulled her onto his chest.

It was his preferred cuddling position for comforting her, but somehow it felt different. “Okay, maybe just a tiny bit,” she said, muttering it into his shirt. “I don’t see how it matters though since you’re trying to pawn me off on somebody else.” 

Suddenly, he was pulling her up his body until she found herself nestled into the crook of his shoulder and neck, flush against him. The fabric of her dress did little to buffer her against the warmth of him.

His rumble of contentment under her made her more pink than her admission of greed for him had. She must be rosy all over by now.

“Fuck, you smell amazing,” he said, turning so that his mouth rested against her ear while he ran his hand down her spine.

Her arms and legs broke out in goosebumps. She felt his lips ghost against her jaw, but her hand covered his lips when he moved to kiss her mouth. This couldn’t happen. They couldn’t keep yo-yo-ing like this. “I can’t kiss you, Mammon,” she said.

“I don’t see any problem,” he said from under her hand, squeezing her thigh where she’d hooked it over his hip, subconsciously climbing him.

“Mammon.” She sighed and rested her forehead against his before removing her hand. “I can’t kiss you with all the mixed signals you give me,” she said, opening her eyes to stare into the piercing blue that was picking her apart. “Yes means yes. Mixed signals mean no.”

“Can’t we just—” he asked, licking his lips as he adjusted his grip around the meat of her leg.

“No,” she whispered. “The most I can offer you is cuddles. Maybe some headpats or the occasional kiss on the cheek.”

“Pfft,” he said, turning his face from her and letting his hand go slack. “I’m not a child. I don’t need you pettin’ my hair.”

“A shame,” she said, and a silence grew between them, giving her a chance to slow her breathing and collect her thoughts. “Anyway, let me know if cuddles, or the occasional cheek kiss, make you...uncomfortable.” She pressed herself up on her hands so that she could look at him properly. “I can cut back or remove them entirely as needed.” 

He rolled his eyes and she could tell he was about to say something stupid.

“And I will cut off all affection entirely if you can’t be nice to me.” She moved to withdraw her leg from his grip but he tightened it, stilling her retreat.

“Whaddya talkin’ about I’m always nice. The Great Mammon is the nicest. You should be grateful! Honoured!”

She held up her hand. “I’m not gonna argue with you about this anymore. Our wishy-washy boundaries are why we keep arguing and I’m tired of it.”

With an exasperated sigh, Mammon released her leg, throwing his hand away from her in an obnoxious show of displeasure. “Fine, it’s not like the Great Mammon would want to kis-that kind of affection from a—” He started to choke on his words, and she rolled away from him with a scowl. He’d clearly forgotten her only commandment: thou shalt not smacktalk the human race.

“ _Fine_ ,” she echoed back to him. “Go sulk in your own room instead.” Quickly, she scooted out of the bed, and walked around it, to stomp her way toward the bathroom. He knew where the door was, and he’d better have used it by the time she had a chance to splash some water on her face, because she doubted it would be enough to have cooled her temper. 

Just once it would be nice if they could talk through something instead of wading through quicksand and getting sucked into the world of tsundere. Why didn’t Leviathan know of a cure for this?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   1. Now I really can’t figure you out Sometimes you’re like a lover, sometimes like a friend [ ▲ ]
> 

> 
> * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UM3ecX69Jo [ ▲ ]


	104. Spill!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Asmo and Satan want answers from Leviathan.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading!

Satan made eye contact with Asmodeus and in sync they moved to corner Leviathan. 

“You’re the only one who can decipher any of that. Spill,” Asmodeus said, his voice cheery but the order he gave to his superior unwavering.

“Yes, please translate,” Satan said. He didn’t stop herding them all to the table, and kept his expression as a fixed smile.

Leviathan ignored their questions but zombie-walked until he dropped, groaning, into a chair at the table side and his hands came up to cover his face. “I won but I almost died!”

“Pish,” Asmodeus said, with a dismissive wave. “She never even touched you! Unlike me!” The flourish of his hand landed on the back of a chair; he pulled it out without a wasted motion.

Leviathan was lucky that he missed the way Asmodeus shimmied with his claim. Satan was not so lucky and the discomfort on his face showed it well. He joined them anyway.

“What are you talking about?” Leviathan asked, his words coming out squeaky and choked. “She moves like the nereídhes! You were there!” He peeked out through his fingers as the other two took their seats. “She didn’t need to touch anyone to—to—You saw her!”

“Yes, just so,” Satan said in a placating ‘ _yes, Dear’_ tone. He folded his hands on the table top. “Now, we need you to decipher all of the music she cycled through. Specifically, the ones she seems to associate with each of us.”

Open and closing his mouth a few times, Leviathan threaded his hands together behind his head and put his forehead on the table. “I—” Leviathan started, clearly trying to regain control of his mind. “Didn’t you have something you wanted to call an in person meeting about?”

 _That_ caught Satan off guard. It appeared even Leviathan wasn’t always single mindedly obsessed; surprising that he chose to reveal his ability to carry two thoughts at once when Satan himself had become so determinedly set on this new topic.

His eyes flit away from where Leviathan was becoming a prone C-clamp around the table and up to Asmodeus’ wide eyes and wider grin. 

“You’re right, as long as we've got the chance, I'd really like to talk,” Satan said as he watched Asmodeus collect Leviathan’s nearby Zwitch and set it down next to his head. “I’ll start us off. I’ve had a bit more time to think on the comparison of command-induced pain in our mistress.”

“You said we were cutting her soul on us,” Leviathan said, his words mumbled against the glossy woodgrain. 

“Precisely.” This roundabout conversation would be the safest way to continue forward while Leviathan couldn’t make eye contact. “That was the case when she commanded us in the hallway, _but_ when she kept Belphie and I from entering the pool…” Satan focused on Leviathan, attempting to gauge his discomfort at discussing how he’d nearly filleted their mistress. It was tough to make out any reaction from the quiet lump of sweater and mop of hair. “When she ordered us to stay out, there didn’t appear to be any physical ramifications. Now, that could be adrenaline or any number of other normal human shock responses—”

“No,” Leviathan said, slowly raising his head from the table and snatching up his Zwitch. He stared at the blank screen between him and the table. “You were right. She only flinched when I bruised her or my nails caught.”  
  
“Aaand?” Asmodeus asked. 

Leviathan scrunched up his shoulders, pushing the collar of his sweater up around his ears.

“If you're going to admit that out in the open and then clam up of course we're going to be curious. Aren’t you going to tell us about your magic-inc—”

A cough from Satan broke up the impending fight. Calling it magic incontinence was sure to end the discussion pre-maturely. “The unusual interaction you had with water,” Satan continued, “perhaps you could elabourate on that.”

The screen of the Zwitch was still black but Leviathan’s eyes didn’t stray from it; he was nearly cross eyed and Satan suspected he was stealing peeks at their reflections rather than face their questioning head on.

“When I tried to pour water into the hall, where you two were, it wouldn’t go. It just pulled us both down into the deep end. And then after, it was spinning too fast and starting to fall over into the hole it made.” His fingers twitched over the buttons on the device. “I tried to create a dome to hide us in but all I could do was slow it down, and then we were heading back to the shallows.”

“There, there,” Asmodeus said, his voice soft and devoid of his usual teasing. “If you saw me in my swimsuit you’d be so stunned by the gorgeousness that you'd lose your mind, but she’s a very close second. I wouldn’t be surprised if you just lost concentration. It happens to the best of us. Well, not me, but…”

Leviathan pushed the Zwitch ahead of him so that both arms were straight lines ahead of him when he put his forehead back down on the table. 

“Asmo,” Satan said, ready to intervene again.

“Buuuut!” Asmodeus said, changing tack quickly and with added pep, “but that’s not related to the pain thing so it’s probably not what Satan is looking for.”

On occasion, Asmodeus was more clever and less self absorbed than Satan gave him credit for.

“Thank you, Asmo,” Satan said when the only response from Leviathan was a weak grunt. “I have a growing theory.”

At that, Leviathan sat up and looked at him. “Do you mean the sin thing you and Mammon were talking about?”

He hadn’t expected that. Other than Belphegor, there was no one else privy to his research on the matter. Had Leviathan taken to placing cameras and other technology around the house again? “Yes,” he said slowly. Now that he had their full attention it was best not to break it. “It’s my hypothesis that whenever she is experiencing distress she’s more susceptible to our sins _and_ somehow taps into some of our power.”

“That would explain that little lust issue over the weekend,” Asmodeus said, tenting his fingers in an uncharacteristic show of nerves. He wasn’t meeting either of their hard stares and eventually threw up his hands. “How was I supposed to know she wasn’t going to try and get it out of her system?”

“That’s actually a fair question,” Satan said. He brought his hand up to his chin in thought. “It disappeared on its own when in Mammon’s presence and when she syphoned from me and Belphie she slept it away.”

“Um, excuse me, what?” Leviathan asked, beating Asmodeus to the punch.

Satan pulled himself back to sit straight in his chair, his head back further than natural for good posture. This was a bit more uncomfortable than he’d expected; Leviathan was clearly annoyed at being left out of the loop, but at least Asmodeus still seemed interested.

“Don’t interrupt,” Asmodeus said, shushing Leviathan.

“Yes, let's not get carried away. Belphie wanted to borrow her for something and as you know Rancor is not his greatest fan. He reached for her despite our mistress’ warning and she grabbed him while he was attempting to put Rancor to sleep.”

“Aaaaand?” Asmodeus asked. His D.D.D. had gone off a number of times in quick succession but he was ignoring it steadily.

“And she lost her temper and grabbed his arm. To be honest it felt like she wanted to tear his arm off. Delightful. But, as I was saying: his power began to put her to sleep and the moment she slumped into me she was wide awake and able to squeeze Belphie’s arm hard enough to bruise him.”

“Why didn’t we know about this?” Leviathan asked, all of his limbs kicked out as he pushed away from the table. “It’s not fair! What’s the point of our club if you’re going to hide important things?”

“Wait a sec, Leviiii,” Asmodeus cut in, nabbing the edge of his sweater when he tried to get up and storm off. “Satan told us about the notebook right away and I told you about her confessions practically in real-time. Don’t get all huffy over nothing.”

Leviathan’s shoulders slumped, defeated by a moment of rationality from Asmodeus of all demons.

“Now, come sit back down,” Asmodeus said, releasing the fabric in his hand and flicking away the texture from his fingertips before patting the chair next to him. “We can’t have a reverse harem club without the president after all.”

Daily, Asmodeus used his ability to charm and captivate the way one would use a cudgel. Thus it always came as a surprise to Satan when he would see the delicate use of enticement in this manner; Asmodeus could, if he wanted to, be surgically precise in his placation and seduction. 

“I guess that’s true...without me you wouldn’t really know how the tropes work with different dynamics. I mean if Beel is running late to class and bumps into her while he has toast in his mouth our whole house of cards is going to come down around us.”

Satan looked to Asmodeus for translation but he seemed equally perplexed. Thankfully, Leviathan was still engrossed in explaining a different trope and missed their expressions. 

“Moving on!” Asmodeus said.

“Thank you, Levi. That was most...enlightening,” Satan said. Asmodeus was right, pushing ahead would be best or they’d be here all day learning about how Lamia tails differed from those of the Naga’s in animation. He looked between his brothers. “I’m not sure how much you know, but Mammon and I were also discussing her new, and apparently oblivious, use of Celestial speech.”

“Satan, I know we joke about her being an angel,” Asmodeus said, tilting his head forward and squinting a bit as if staring down at a problem he had yet to solve, “but now isn’t really the time for that.”

“Would that I were,” he said. “During her row with Belphie, I heard her speak it and apparently Belphie heard her speak it once before when they were intimate.” He couldn’t decide if the faint pink that rose to his cheeks was discomfort from their staring or Asmodeus’ knowing grin when he’d said ‘intimate.’

Leviathan shook his head as if to remove unwanted images. “What does that have to do with my water and the hit point damage to her soul?”

“Finally, we're here. I've been waiting for this point,” Satan said, spreading his hands out like the carnival master who’d finally captured the attention of the entire audience. “I believe that she isn’t just catching the bleed over of our sins, but amplifying it to the point where she can’t purge it successfully on her own.” He held up his hand, unwilling to be interrupted again. “While she’s touching one of us it seems to have greater penetrance.”

Asmodeus raised his eyebrows numerous times in quick succession, in what passed for a lewd gesture. 

“And it’s my theory,” Satan continued, ignoring the eyebrow waggling, “that while touching one of us she has enough energy to protect her soul from the effect of magical commandments.”

“Uh huh. Well, that’s a lovely story,” Asmodeus said, his mouth pursed cynically to one side, “and I want to believe it. I do, but what is the likelihood that a magicless human can…” He waved his hand, looking for the word.

“Metabolize magic?” Satan asked, his smile growing wider by the second. “You’ve said yourself that she drew more magic out of you than even Solomon’s ever been able to achieve.”

Asmodeus cupped his cheek and tilted his head to the side in thought, a practiced pose he must’ve held ten thousand times for it to be so natural. “Ugh, I’m completely worn out. This whole conversation is giving me frown lines.”

“Wait a minute!” Leviathan shouted, pointing his finger at Satan, Zwitch long forgotten. He drew in a deep breath. “This is just like ‘Ayashi no Ceres’ because she had no idea she was a celestial being, but she was also a reincarnation, and she also had to kill her twin brother to survive, and they’d been killing each other like that through every life cycle all because he hid her seal skin.”

Putting a hand to his forehead, Satan blinked at the rapid fire information.

“Levi, Levi, our little diamond in the rough,” Asmodeus said, reeling Leviathan back in, “as much as I love the building of anticipation, I need you to say it just an eensy weensy bit less Otaku-y.”

Leviathan gave an exceptionally dorky laugh. “Right, you normies wouldn’t be able to follow along. She’s speaking like an angel, so she’s showing her inheritance, and Satan,” he looked to Satan for confirmation, “thinks that’s why she’s able to use our magic, or maybe use ours to unlock hers?”

“Precisely!” The unlocking of her own power was an interesting premise, something Satan hadn’t yet considered. Not that he’d admit that to them.

“Well, that explains why Publedina was able to keep pumping out the tunes,” Asmodeus said, looking less excited than Satan had anticipated. “I’m more interested in what all of those songs meant.”

“Who cares about human music?” Leviathan asked. “This means there are so many more ways to extend her life if she has her own magic!”

“That’s true,” Asmodeus said, with only a hint of a pout at being shot down again. “I pester Solomon about it all the time but he’s been hinting at a trade for something first.”

Satan rubbed his hand over his face. “Whatever it is, it has to be better than bathing her in blood every night or borrowing an aegis for eternity.”

A guttural “Ugh” erupted from Asmodeus. “Gorgon heads are so out of style right now, and good luck getting her to wear a severed head anyway, Devildom knows I’ve tried.”

“So...you’ve all been trying to figure it out too?” Leviathan asked, his voice small and hopeful.

“Of course!” they both said.

“Praise be to Ruri-chan. I’ve been wracking my brain trying to find a way to keep her alive that wouldn’t kill her!” Leviathan groaned with relief and flopped back over the table.

Satan laughed quietly. “If she continues to develop her magical ‘circuitry’ over the next few decades” he said, trying to put it in terms readily understandable for Leviathan, “then it might not be too dangerous of an undertaking.”

“That’s all well and good,” Asmodeus said, planting an elbow on the table before prodding Leviathan in the side with obvious impatience, “but what _I_ want to know is what all those songs meant when she was looking at _me_!”

Jolting away from the stabbing finger, Leviathan sat up before quickly folding back in on himself. “How am I supposed to know that?” he asked. “There were way too many noises. We’d need to record the whole thing and then I’d have to cross reference it with sooo many different databases!” His shoulders slumped impossibly lower and he slid into his familiar sulky disposition. “I don’t even know what the answer to her secret was.” 

Satan scoffed. “Why do all of my comrades have seaweed for brains?” he said mostly to himself, then, “She spelled out ‘I Love Levi.’”

And Leviathan was gone before either of them could think to grab him.

Asmodeus couldn’t stop laughing. 

“Send Publedina to Leviathan so that he can ‘download’ her record,” Satan said wearily. He shook his head with a smile. Maybe this wasn’t the worst club after all.

* * *

Eventually, Asmodeus had to wipe the tears from the corners of his eyes. Leviathan was long gone; if only they’d gotten a picture of his face, Asmodeus would’ve saved it to his ‘must keep’ folder and open it when he needed a pick-me-up.

He touched up his make-up and replied to the most important messages on his D.D.D. The rest of his adoring fans would just have to wait; he had a date.

It wasn’t until he was half-way to Purgatory hall, to pump his favourite sorcerer for information, that his D.D.D. let out a flurry of alerts of a different tone. The pop up notification revealed Mammon and Leviathan spamming the Emergency chat.

‘Ugh, what is Levi whinging about now?’ Asmodeus wondered. How many times could Mammon steal something from him without him noticing for a week? Maybe there were tickets going on sale again and Leviathan needed them to stand in line. He’d look at it later.

With a horrific sense of foreboding, Asmodeus watched the wrought iron fence next to him sway and creak, rolling with the ground beneath it. Only after a moment of silence did the roar of rage catch up to the seismic wave; Asmodeus turned and ran back to the house faster than he’d ever moved before. “Okay, Karasu, read the last ten messages from Mammon!” he shouted to the D.D.D. in his hand.


	105. Angry Human is Done

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC is done. She's had it. Give me freedom or give me death.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for beta reading this!
> 
> And a super big thank-you to everyone for your patience with this chapter. I think you'll forgive me though when you realize the follow up chapter will have a day less wait between then and now <3

_He rolled his eyes and she could tell he was about to say something stupid._

_“And I will cut off all affection entirely if you can’t be nice to me.” She moved to withdraw her leg from his grip but he tightened it, stilling her retreat._

_“Whaddya talkin’ about I’m always nice. The Great Mammon is the nicest. You should be grateful! Honoured!”_

_She held up her hand. “I’m not gonna argue with you about this anymore. Our wishy-washy boundaries are why we keep arguing and I’m tired of it.”_

_With an exasperated sigh, Mammon released her leg, throwing his hand away from her in an obnoxious show of displeasure. “Fine, it’s not like the Great Mammon would want to kis-that kind of affection from a—” He started to choke on his words, and she rolled away from him with a scowl. He’d clearly forgotten her only commandment: **thou shalt not smacktalk the human race**._

_“Fine,” she echoed back to him. “Go sulk in your own room instead.” Quickly, she scooted out of the bed, and walked around it, to stomp her way toward the bathroom. He knew where the door was, and he’d better have used it by the time she had a chance to splash some water on her face, because she doubted it would be enough to have cooled her temper._

_Just once it would be nice if they could talk through something instead of wading through quicksand and getting sucked into the world of tsundere. Why didn’t Leviathan know of a cure for this?_

* * *

Mammon tossed his legs over the side of the bed, and adjusted his pants, unsuccessfully attempting to relieve the discomfort he’d wrought on himself.

By the time she had one foot across the threshold to the bathroom he was right behind her. 

Her whole body tensed and she paused to look over her shoulder at him. “ _ What _ ?” she asked sharply. That single word was loaded and ready to go off. 

“Uh,” he said, every sensation in his body suddenly being replaced by awkward dread. There was already a suspicious hint to her question. “Just...I’m not s’posed to let you out of my sight.”

Slowly, one of her eyebrows rose, and she pivoted to fully look up at him. “Not even if I need to use the toilet?” The way she said it didn’t sound like a question.

Fishing his D.D.D. out of his pocket he quickly scrolled through his messages to find the order from Lucifer.

She scowled as she read it and then pushed the device away. “I don’t care what Lucifer says. Everyone requires personal space.” 

“If it weren’t about your safety, I’d totally ignore this and face the consequences like usual, but there’s like twenty more paragraphs about why I hafta and what he’ll do if I don’t.” Couldn’t she cut him some slack?

“What if I want to get laid, are you going to just stand there and watch?” she asked, raising her hands up in exasperated disbelief.

“You can spend a little while not getting laid,” Mammon said quietly, swallowing his own anger. It would be a miracle if he didn’t crush his D.D.D. by the time this argument was over.

“Says you! I’ve spent months being celebate. It’s awful!” 

“Look, I don’t know what you want me to say.” He bent his knees to try and talk to her, closer to her own level, and stuck his hands in his pockets. “You left your room last night without warning and now…” He forced the air out of his lungs instead of reaching forward and shaking her. “And now I have my orders.”

She pulled the D.D.D. out from between his palm and his pocket and dialed; the expression on her face was so reminiscent of Satan that Mammon took a half step back, giving her space to wander toward her dresser.

“Lucifer. No, stop talking. I’m trying so hard not to lose my temper with you, but what the fuck? What gives you the right to limit my—”

Mammon reached for the D.D.D. but she warded him away with a look that if it’d had any magic behind it might’ve killed a Little Demon. His flinch was poorly hidden and he knew it.

“Oh really…I don’t think you want to say that,” she said, her voice getting louder. “Really? Uh huh.”

There was a moment of silence, where Mammon could just barely make out the sound of Lucifer’s voice around her ear, and it gave him a sliver of hope for peace. 

Unrestrained loathing was the only way to describe her response. She was shaking with the strength of her anger. If Satan had been nearby, Mammon would’ve picked her up and dragged her as far away as possible, but this wasn’t Satan’s influence, and he didn’t know how to quell it. 

“You’re going to rue the day you said that. Would you like to know what I think?” she asked, the decibel of her voice now at a full shout. “I think you’re a weak and shrivelled little angel hiding behind his pride and—”

Mammon’s hands moved of their own volition. “Lucifer, she didn’t mean that,” he said quickly, standing on his tiptoes to keep her grabbing hands away from the D.D.D. 

“YES, I DID! You’re a close minded slug and I hope you choke on your own bitterness!”

Mammon squeezed his eyes shut as the line went dead. He had to think. Take a calming breath and think. What should he do? He needed to call the others, or Diavolo, or—. “What have you done?'' he asked as she ran to her desk and began scribbling on a bit of scrap paper.

Glued to her side as she ran to the door, Mammon opened it before she reached for the knob. At least she knew they needed to get out of Dodge.

But she slapped a paper on the outside of the frame rather than follow him out and he felt a sudden, dizzying panic. She wasn’t going to run. She wasn’t going to run! Fuck! 

“We’ve needed to have a chat for a while. Let the fucker come,” she said, darkly. She walked back to the middle of the room, and began unbuttoning the bottom most buttons of her dress.

“Stop that!” Mammon said, grabbing at her shoulders to turn her around, to look at him, to talk to him, anything!

“Publedina,” she said to the air, steadfastly ignoring him as she dropped the folds of her dress between her legs.

His hands leapt away from her when he couldn’t get her to look at him, and they anchored themselves in his hair. He was going to go bald from pulling at it. “What are you doing? We need to make a plan. We need to get out of here. Now!”

“How can you be this old and’ve never seen someone gird their loins?” she asked, looking up from her half crouch as if he were the idiot in this situation. 

Publedina slid down from the tree, lighting up the side of their human’s face.

“There you are,” she said, finishing tying off her dress with a sharp tug, after having wrapped it back and around her thighs and hips. “I don’t have much time so you’re going to need to remember everything I say and take it to Solomon. Do you understand?”

The mal’akh bobbed up and down at her eye level as Mammon lost his patience and began to drag her out of the direct line of sight of the doorway with one hand wrapped around her bicep. They were leaving. Even if that meant he had to kick another hole into the kitchen wall.

“Solomon, I’ve challenged the Old Man,” she said as Mammon tugged her towards the wall that separated them from the kitchen. “You know where my will is. Don’t let any little punks spray paint the crypt. I have your word so don’t make me haunt you. Don’t tell Simeon until I’m gone.” With that she gave a curt nod and the mal’akh disappeared with a speed that belied its waddling form. 

The practiced ease with which she said it, despite her anger, made Mammon’s skin crawl. He let go of her long enough to toss her coffin-shaped bookshelf out of the way and bring his elbow down on the stone behind it.

“Levi,” she said softly into her own D.D.D., It was nearly lost in the sound of her crumbling wall. “Sweetheart, I know you won’t get this until later but I need you to remember this isn’t your fault. This was a long time coming. Take care of your brothers.”

Mammon froze, elbow halfway back to his side. Did she really think he wouldn’t be fast enough? He could out run Lucifer any day of the week.

“And Levi,” she said, a dark humour in her voice, “you better find my reincarnation or I won’t forgive you.” She let the D.D.D. fall from her hands to the floor as the door behind them burst into the room. “ **Stay** ,” she said, and Mammon froze to the spot. 

He watched in slow motion as the door shrieked off its hinges and struck the opposite wall, splintering. ‘Why would she? She wouldn't! She couldn't!’ Mammon’s arms flailed forward, trying to grab at her, but she’d already stepped away from him and toward the door. ‘Fuck!’ He’d underestimated how angry she was.

The soft lines of her mouth, that had tugged at his heart strings when she’d hung up on Leviathan, were now a fiction of his imagination; she stood resolute, just inches from his fingertips, and he tried to swallow his panic. He couldn’t watch it again. That moment when she revealed Belphegor’s existence to Lucifer hadn’t happened in this timeline, but he still remembered echoes of Lucifer’s fury, how he’d been ready to tear her limb from limb. He had to get out. He had to get her out. They needed to run!

“Let’s go, Old Man,” she taunted.

Mammon couldn’t see what had brought the sudden laughter to her lips, but he heard Lucifer cursing. ‘In 1-2-3-4. Hold 1-2-3-4,’ he thought, coaching his breathing, while he tried to focus his thoughts and numb the panic sliding up his spine. ‘Out 1-2-3-4. Hold 1-2-3-4.’ He just had to give into the command and it would relent. He’d done this a thousand times before. Shutting his eyes, he committed himself to staying completely still, just as she’d commanded. 

And then he felt the snap of the thread that had stitched him in place.

In motion before he could give it thought, he wrapped his arms around her and dragged her back with him just as the wall in front of them erupted in a spray of plaster and wood. ‘Safe. Thank fuck!’ 

From their new location, he was able to see the weak glow of the charm that had rebounded Lucifer from the threshold, like walking into cellophane across the doorframe. A feeble talisman tossed in his face, she might as well have spat at his feet.

The dust and debris were still thick in the air, but Mammon heard the command clearly.

“ **Mammon, give her to me. NOW** .” Lucifer was in his demonic form; there was little holding him back from blasting away the entire room except for his own sense of decorum. 

“I can’t,” Mammon croaked out and tightened his arms around her.

“He can!” she shouted directly after.

Slowly, Mammon inched them backward and away as Lucifer stepped over the rubble of the wall.

“Hand her over right now and you won‘t be punished, Mammon.”

It was clear Lucifer was barely keeping it together: his gloved hands were fisted at his side and his body leaned toward them aggressively. It looked worse for them every time his wings flapped with agitation. “Dar al Gani” he said, miraculously without a snarl.

“Let’s all just calm down,” Mammon said, moving away exactly the same amount his leader stalked forward. “Lucifer, why don’t we go get some demonus, just the two of us, and wind down a bit? We can talk about old times...” 

“Mammon,” Lucifer growled.

Mammon could hear the way the deep vibrations made the ends of her bones rub and squeak against one another, but she didn’t flinch. “Don’t you dare command me away,” he whispered directly into her ear. “I’ll never forgive ya if you do.”

She twitched at that, her face turning slightly toward the sound of his voice, but her attention was gone as quickly as it had come.

“What’s wrong, Lucifer?” she asked, simpering for effect. “Mad that a powerless human told you something you didn’t want to hear?” She looked up and Mammon felt her lips on the underside of his jaw, baring her throat to Lucifer as she whispered, “Mammon,  **let go** .”

His hands sprung open and she stepped into Lucifer’s lunging arms.

“What, is that all you’ve got?” she asked, as he tossed her over his shoulder so that her face was smothered in his wings. “Hurry up and kill me, asshole! I don’t have all day.”

Storming out of her room and into the hallway, the oozing black smoke that rippled out from Lucifer disintegrated the remainder of her low wall.

"I never thought there was someone out there who could surpass Mammon in stupidity,” Lucifer said. The venom in his words echoed in the hallway as he began marching toward the stairs. “But you’ve proven me wrong yet again, and helped me to understand the foolishness of humans. It was my mistake to select you!" 

“Fuck you, you shrivelled old worm.  You jawless, sac-less lamprey, you can’t even look me in the eyes when you say that! ” She was kicking her feet and trying to tear out his feathers when Mammon came up behind them.

“Lucifer, let her down. You know you don’t want to do this.” He’d played this role before, putting himself between Lucifer and the others. It just took time, time he wasn’t sure she had. “Let’s all just take a second to think this through.”

“There’s nothing to think through,” she said, driving her knee into Lucifer’s chest. It must’ve felt like attacking a rock wall but she didn’t relent. “I’m a fucking prisoner here!”

“You ignorant, impertinent, little flea!” Lucifer shouted. He brought his hand down on the backs of her thighs with a resounding ‘ _ smack _ !’ “I have tried to treat you like a guest, but if you can’t be trusted with a babysitter then you’re going to spend the remainder of your stay chained up in the dungeon.”

“The fuck I am!” she said, and Mammon saw feathers clutched victoriously in her upraised fist before she brought it back down as hard as she could on the hinge of Lucifer’s wing. She was going to break her hand on him. 

“There is nothing,  _ has been nothing _ , appropriate about the way you treat me! Put me down you worthless lap dog!”

When Lucifer winced, Mammon took the chance to speed in front of him and block their path. He just needed to buy time until Lucifer came to his senses. “Hey, don't you dare ignore me!” Mammon said, his hands up in front of him to halt Lucifer’s continued pace. “What’s Lord Diavolo gonna say when he hears you’ve accidentally popped off his exchange student’s head ‘cause you were too rough with ‘em?”

_ That  _ gave Lucifer pause, and he narrowed his eyes at Mammon appraisingly. The angry hiss of black smoke wasn’t as loud as it was before but it still billowed around his feet, singeing the carpet.

“Put me the fuck down before I snap your fucking horns off!” She was trying her damnedest to push herself upright and away from the shoulder that dug into the small of her belly. Mammon almost couldn’t look at her as she struggled.

A sneer marred Lucifer’s features, curling his lip into something ugly and malicious. “You have yet to follow through on any of your threats,” he said, clearly disgusted by her false bravado. He swatted her ass for good measure. “The weak should be silent.”

Losing her balance she grabbed at his throat. Mammon could practically feel Lucifer’s contemptuous laughter at her attempts at freedom, as if the vibrations were under his own hand, and it twisted his guts into knots. It was one thing for Lucifer to treat him that way, it was another entirely for Lucifer to play with _ her  _ like this.

“Fine!” she shouted and grabbed Lucifer’s horn with her other hand.

Mammon watched in horror and awe while she pressed her tiny blunt nails into Lucifer’s throat, yanking for all she was worth on the tip of his nearest horn. The blood drained from his face when he heard a ‘ _ CRACK! _ ’ and she tumbled forward again, black spike in hand.

With a grunt, Lucifer shrugged his shoulder and she fell ahead of him to the carpet below.

Her heavy breathing was music to Mammon’s ears, but the blood on her fist, and the horn in it, made him heave momentarily with fear. He could already feel the rage swelling around Lucifer, warping the gravity around them and heating the air.

At the first hint of movement, Mammon was on his knees, his arm around Lucifer’s leg. It didn’t matter if it was humiliating or weak; Mammon didn’t need glory. He needed his human.

“Lucifer, I embrace your knees and I’m beggin’ ya to show mercy.” He could barely breathe with the intensity of his desperation. “I invoke the ancient rite of supplication.” His voice caught in his throat and cracked. He was the very definition of submissive now but would Lucifer still cast him aside?

“Remember my years of loyal service,” he said staring up, his eyes wide as he reached his hand up toward Lucifer’s chin. “I don’t expect her ta understand, but don’t destroy the last of Lord Diavolo’s hard won ξενία1 over this.”

The lack of answer was deafening and Mammon let his hand fall flat between the buttons of Lucifer’s waistcoat, keeping far from the forearm or hand usually touched in these proceedings. “If ya need blood justice, then take it from me,” Mammon said. “Have pity.”

“Absolutely not!” he heard his human shout from behind him. “This is my fight. Stay out of it, Mammon!”

Why? Why couldn’t she, just for once, stay down, stay quiet? Why did she choose now to catch her breath and intervene? She hadn’t ordered him away, but this was just as bad.

The lack of force Lucifer used to dislodge Mammon from his side was still enough to send him skidding a couple of feet, far enough for him to land next to her. Preparing to get up and try once more, he flailed his arms uncertainly when he was captured. Something soft smothered his face and kept him blind.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered into his hair. 

He felt the briefest moment of her lips against his crown before she was jerked away from him.

“Are you ready to beg for my forgiveness?” Lucifer asked. There was nothing kind in his question. There would be no forgiveness. “What? Nothing to say now?”

Surging to his feet, Mammon wrapped himself around her, ignoring Lucifer’s hold on her wrist. He bowed his head until he could rest his mouth against her shoulder. There had to be a way to fix this. They were talking now at least, that had to be worth something.

“Your stupidity and cowardice has rendered me speechless.” She spat the words at him. “It must be painful to be so ignorant of your own shortcomings.”

Mammon looked up the length of her arm, held tightly in Lucifer’s red glove. She was still clutching her bloody shiv and he panicked as he watched her disappear into nothing. Rage and nothing.

A gasp for air, startled and tight, came from her and she was gone from his embrace. 

Chills swept through Mammon and he staggered backward. ‘Where?’ He pulled at his clothing, trying to find a trace of her. Had Lucifer destroyed her, swept her from existence as their father had threatened to do with Lilith? He couldn’t breathe and fell to his knees.

* * *

Different scenery hurtled past her as she was yanked backward. She heard the slap of wet leaves and felt the jarring drag of her feet against sod and roots, but there was nothing to see except for blurring light and the smell of greenery, and then water.

There was no time to take a breath. She was drowning. The speed of whatever was pulling her didn’t lessen despite how she struggled and kicked.

Her gasps for air were long and painful, each draught felt like choking anew and ended in deep, barking coughs. Hard, wooden floorboards cracked loudly beneath her knees and forearms as she choked and coughed up murky, green water. 

“Malbolge's ditches!” Satan shouted from somewhere nearby.

She pushed the wet hair out of her eyes and tried to clear the snot from her face, and the back of her throat, to keep from wretching. “What. The. Fuck?” she croaked. 

“Did you—Did you go swimming in the lake?” he asked, kneeling at her side to peel soggy vegetation off of her face. “How did you get in here?”

Coughing once more, she took the handkerchief he offered rather than spit up on his floor again.

“What is  _ that _ ?” Satan asked with a new level of worry to his seriousness.

“I got mad and snapped Lucifer’s horn off...sorry in advance,” she said, hoarsely. Her eyes were watering so heavily she couldn’t see him properly. “Any chance you can hide me somewhere until we both cool down?”

It appeared Satan didn’t know where to put his hands; they took turns rising and falling from his chest to his temples. “Not while you’re holding _ that _ !” he said, finally throwing his hands up in the air.

The house began to shake and Satan’s eyes went wide. That was all she saw before he was wrapped around her. His magic circled them both, keeping the worst of the Infernal shout at bay and her lungs from shaking until they stuck to one another and sealed shut. 

When the sound stopped she coughed into his sweater; if she survived this, she’d have to replace it for sure.

There was a loud crash, somewhere outside the shelter of Satan’s arms, and she felt the magic around them blow out like a candle in a strong breeze.

“Lucifer, as hypocritical as this sounds, you need to calm down,” Satan said.

“Stick me with that again and it will be the last thing you do,” Lucifer growled, ignoring Satan completely. “Come here. We’re going to have a  **talk** .”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   1. ξενία (pronounced zenee-a): a host-guest relationship with required hospitality and ritual shown to those far from home. These ties were often honoured due to gods (of varying pantheons) who masqueraded as travellers, and also acted as a means of forging alliances and exchanging news/culture.  [ ▲ ]
> 

> 
> The Performance of Xenia in the Iliad:
> 
> Diomedes happily declares his feelings of finding an old family friend on the battlefield:
> 
>   
> 
> 
> ...and with winning words he called out to Glaucus,
> 
> the yourg captain, "splendid--you are my friend,
> 
> my guest from the days of our grandfathers long ago!
> 
> Noble Oeneus hosted your brave Bellerophon once,
> 
> He held him in his halls, twenty whole days,
> 
> And they gave each other handsome gifts of friendship.
> 
> My kinsman offered a gleaming sword-belt, rich red,
> 
> Bellerophon gave a cup, two-handed, solid gold--
> 
> I left it at home when I set out for Troy. (11. 256-264, Book 6).
> 
>   
> 
> 
> Diomedes emphasizes that he never for one day forgot the dear friendship that his grandfather Oeneus set up with the stranger traveler Bellerophon, the grandfather of Glaucus. Diomedes assures Glaucus that Oeneus and Bellerophon once exchanged previous gifts and thus established ties of friendship between the two households and that such an ancestral guest-friendship between the two families should by no means be forgotten by later progeny.


	106. Have a Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC and Lucifer have a long overdue "conversation."
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading

The world blurred around her as Lucifer picked her up from the floor and sped to his room.

“Are you going to listen or do I have to gag you?” he asked as he tossed her none too gently onto his couch.

“I know, I know...I stood up for myself,” she said, pushing herself up from the uncomfortably firm seating. “Go ahead and pretend to be the victim now. You do it so well, Lucifer.”

His foot planted on the glass table and he kicked it aside, sending it through a chair to shatter across the fireplace. He stormed past the wreckage and into a side room, only returning to loom over her when he had a belt in hand. 

“Fine, fine, yes,” she said, not keen to be gagged.

“I think you forgot a word.” 

“I'm not adding ‘sir’ unless you're naked.” She looked up at him with a level of disdain she didn’t know she could hold.

“There is no point in being disobedient. You won’t get your way, you’ll only end up getting punished.” 

“I’m too tired to play into your power dynamics,” she said, bringing her free hand up to drag over her face, the other still clutched his broken horn. “If anything, I should be given an award for keeping my mouth shut when there's so much that needs to be said.” 

“Really?” he asked. It wasn’t a question. “And what needs to be said with your knife in my back?”

“What a perfect fucking metaphor,'' she said, standing up and waggling the jagged bit of horn at him. “Only you could damage yourself so well.”

“Well, it seems you still have the strength to talk back. I suppose we should do something about that.”

“Oh nooooo,” she said, rolling her eyes for effect. “Not another fear tactic to replace the fact that I won’t follow you blindly.”

“I’m sorry, what was that? Did you say you want me to make the ropes **tighter?** ”

“If you need to frighten and beat me then you better get on with it. Mammon’s existential crisis won’t last forever and I’m sure the rest of the Devildom heard your temper tantrum.”

“You’re begging to be hung up by your ankles, aren’t you?” he asked, still waiting for her to begin shaking in fear as she had done so many times before. When she didn’t flinch he folded the belt in half and pulled it tight to snap loudly in the air between them. He leaned into her space so that all she could see was the swirling red of his eyes. “Would you just do as you’re told for once, or do I need to remake you into something more deferential?” 

“I can't be unmade, Lucifer,” she said with a deceptive calm, “and the sooner you figure that out the sooner we can get along.” 

“If it means you will recognize and obey my words, I _will_ break you.” 

She flinched when he grabbed her forearm once more and began dragging her toward the lit wall sconce next to his bed. Digging in her heels and leaning away from him did nothing; her feet slid on the polished, wooden floor. ‘Like fuck we’re playing this game,’ she thought and brought her makeshift shiv down on Lucifer’s arm.

The sound of rending fabric instead of a painful yowl told her she’d missed. It didn’t matter that the backs of her knees had hit the edge of his bed when she stumbled, what mattered was that she’d made him let go. “There is no one in the three realms with the power to break me,” she said, her words quiet and dangerous, and she gripped the horn she’d taken hostage tighter. A sliver of it still bit into the meat of her thumb. 

“So arrogant.” He lunged into her space and she fell back onto the bed.

“Oh, you can hurt me,” she said, sitting up as fast as she could, “break my heart, damage parts of my mind, kill me, but I _know_ who I am, and who I'm meant to be. My mama saw to that, and so did her mother.” 

He narrowed his eyes. “Don't delude yourself, human.” 

Her laughter was without mirth and tinged with madness. “You think Lilith wouldn’t make her girl children strong enough to withstand the world? Earth can be so much crueler than The Devildom, especially to its womenfolk.”

“Your only purpose is to stay alive for the remainder of the year,” he said, biting back something else in favour of another question. “Why won’t you just serve your purpose?” 

She spat the words at him. “Because when you’re wrong I will tell you that you’re wrong.” Kicking out, she caught him in the thighs with each point of her argument. “If I have to lead you back to yourself then I will. Stop thinking in black and white, when you know that you’ve made me into shades of grey.” 

“How dare you presume to—” He grabbed her by the round of her shoulders and upper arms, completely pinning her in place.

“How dare I presume to know you?” She threw back her head and laughed until she thought she’d never breathe again. There were tears tracking down her cheekbones threatening to run down along her ears. “Do you think I _enjoy_ not knowing if my memories are my own? If the voice that occasionally haunts me will return?” She struggled under him, lifted joints to stab at him and shift their weight. “You say I don’t fucking know you. No, what you mean is how dare I not follow you! Serve you!’” 

His wings fanned out, whether in shock or anger she didn’t know, but they quickly snapped shut, clenched flat against his back. Let him be as confused as she was. She would echo back words she shouldn’t know until he saw her truth.

“Once you would have killed me when you realized how much weakness I’ve created here, but I’m not sure you can anymore. For a whole week you accidentally called me Lilith.” She fought to keep her jaw from clenching shut and muzzling her anger. “To serve doesn't always mean to follow, Lucifer. ”

He stared into her eyes, the red no longer replacing the black entirely.

“Do it. Kill me,” she said earnestly. “You can’t right now, can you? And it’s not because of Diavolo. Noooo, you’d find a way to salvage that P.R. disaster, mitigate his disappointment. What’s another few thousand years to restart the program?”

His hands squeeze around her biceps, not using his monstrous strength, but enough to make her cry out.

“You can’t kill me until you stop thinking of me as a piece of her!”

He growled loudly enough to make her choke and her eyes watered again at the change in pressure around them.

“I’ve heard the way you grumble and growl. Don’t think I can’t hear what you feel!” She tried to sit up, uncaring that she was pressing herself up into him. Suddenly, she went limp and he dropped closer to her as a result. “I cannot ask for forgiveness for something I have not done,” she said softly, “but the time is already upon us. Let me be your scapegoat and bear the fault." 

Immediately, his hands lifted from her arms, and he began to move away, but not before she shoved him.

“Do you know how fucked up it is to have some of her memories? Memories of your words?” 

When he stumbled back she continued. “Do you? I already don’t know if _this_ is real, or if I’m strapped down in a psych ward, and it’s all in my head, but to have someone else’s voice, someone else’s memories? Sometimes, I can’t tell what’s mine and what isn’t. And in all of that, all I want, all _she_ wants, is for you imbeciles to get out of your own way and be happy.”

“I will not be ruled by someone else’ whims,” Lucifer said, looking away from her dismissively, as if she hadn’t just bared her soul to him.

She saw the way his left hand twitched at his side before he hid it in the small of his back. “LOOK AT ME!” she shouted. “What _am_ I?”

“You’re a human. A petulant human who has ensnared my most loyal brethren. You even had Mammon debase himself at my knees!”

“Either _you_ wouldn’t forgive me for letting him stay at my side, or he wouldn’t forgive me for sending him away. You’re not my demon. _He is!_ ”

“What insipid reasoning. I should’ve known a human wouldn’t have enough will of their own to choose for themselves.”

“Am I though?” she asked pointedly, sliding to the edge of the mattress until the tips of her toes dragged over the floor. “What’s left of me that you brought down here?” She held her arms out, limbs bare for him to see. “Find a single part of me that hasn’t been patched or regenerated.”

* * *

He focused on her and it took everything in him not to recoil. Why had he never noticed before? She was practically alight with magic. Filled with the light of her soul, she’d always been bright, but he could see what _now_ made up that light, competing with her own: bits his brothers’ pacts held her stitched together, healing magics of red, orange and blue, hints of Satan’s magic clung to her hair, and old poltices lay still embedded in layers of skin. Nothing remained of her left arm.

“What are you afraid of, Lucifer?” she asked, walking towards him. “Everyday, I try to stay so calm and keep it together, but I'm in the middle of one of the most intense mental breakdowns; if I can weather this why can’t you at least _try_ to let go of the familiar?”

“What have we done to you?” he whispered, stopping himself from reaching out lest she break apart like a pillar of salt.

“You made me mad with courage and fear,” she said with a pained smile.

“Or perhaps just mad...”

“Why can’t you just learn to be happy?” The waspish bite had returned to her words.

“The only people who think there’s a time limit for grief, have never lost a piece of their heart,” he said, growing cold once more as his shock dissipated.

“Grief never dies!” she shouted. “It’s how you survive it that matters, but you’re sitting here, wallowing in your pride, using it as a wall against everything and everyone!” If she had strength enough to shake him she likely would have tried by now.

He pursed his lips and watched her fist squeeze around the sharp edges of his broken horn. "Diavolo brought you here for an 'exchange,' but all I see is that you became a rehabilitation centre.” It was clearly biting into her skin somewhere based on the blood that had yet to dry. “You may belong to this family, but we are not your project. _I_ am not your project."

“I will stop being a rehabilitation centre when you stop being a slave to your pride; there are more important things!” she continued to shout as he turned away from her.

“What precisely is that supposed to mean?” he asked. He knew his words would carry to her.

“Don’t pretend like you don’t know.” Her voice was lower than he’d ever heard before and he strained to listen, waiting for something improbable to occur. Would she suddenly speak in Infernal? The way events warped around her, he couldn’t rule out anything. 

Word for word, she quoted, “‘A family doesn't need to be perfect. It just needs to be united,’” before walking away from the bed, avoiding another direct physical confrontation by making her way back toward the couch. She might as well have slapped him.

He whipped around to look at her. It was one of the last things that Lilith had said before she decided to save her human lover. 

“Only the dose makes a thing not a poison,” she continued. “It's not about your pride, it's about how much of it there is; it's about your heart and who it beats for, and which is stronger. Is your status as an avatar worth your family?”

“You speak of things which you do not understand.” He could feel his gloves tightening as his nails brought themselves to sharpened points once more.

She snorted derisively and stopped at the shelving unit behind the couch. “You know they need you, but they need you softer, they _needed_ you softer, but you had to do it your way to protect yourself,” she said, her free hand sliding over the spine of one of his books, “and I get it. That makes sense.” She sounded thoughtful and then certain, like the oracles of old. “But you can’t _keep_ going on like this. There will be nothing left of you all but your sins. They will control you completely and **you will lose them**.”

“If there isn’t order, if they can’t manage themselves, then we won’t survive together either.”

“Ugh. Ovid was right!” She lifted one of the vases from the built-in shelves and threw it at him.

“You’ve never met Ovid!” 

“You self-important turnip! He was a writer and I can read! And he was right that you need things your way!” She grabbed up a decorative pillow from the couch and launched it at his head. The pillow bounced harmless off his shielding arm, and she flung another at him. “Anything less than perfect is _wrong_ , and _worthless_ , and it’s killing them bit by bit!”

“Compose yourself this instant!”

“What am I to compose myself of, oh Immortal One?” She returned to the shelf and cranked her arm back to throw a heavy, metal, trinket box at him. “You’re a fucking slave to your arrogance! And you make all of them slaves to it because everything must be done your way!”

“Perhaps, if all of you would stop pitching fits and destroying our reputation then I wouldn’t have to come down on them so hard.” She was playing on his last nerve. Lucifer stepped onto the couch, tipping it over as another metal box ricocheted off his hip. It took no effort to knock her over and drag her by the ankle around the couch to its front.

“You’ve become a slave and everyone knows it, you ass,” she said, through hisses of pain and little shrieks at the carpet burn he inflicted, “but that’s no excuse to treat those loyal to you like wayward cattle.” 

“And what is wrong with that?” he asked, raising his arm to dangle her upside down by one leg.

“There’s nothing wrong with it in moderation, or when it’s warranted, you fuckwit!” She tried to stabilize herself with her hands on the floor but he lifted her up away from any chance of steadiness. “You’re smothering everyone!” 

She wasn’t struggling at all now, only the tension that ran through her body with each shouted word jerked her about. “And, maybe, if you weren’t such an unapproachable twat who looks at everyone like dung stuck to his shoe, they wouldn’t have to act up to get your attention!” 

His grip on her ankle tightened and he heard the joint creak. If he broke it she wouldn’t be able to run away and she might even shut up for a time.

“Freedom from heaven isn't worth having if it doesn’t include the freedom to make mistakes!”

That little witch! How dare she continue to use his sister’s words against him! He dropped her leg, righted the couch, and picked up her crumpled form, a hand on each side of her ribcage, to sit her on one of the couch cushions before he knelt down to her eye level. “Now you listen here—” 

The sharp point of his own horn curved down along his cheek to tuck under his chin, where she held it unflinchingly to his throat. Her hands on either side of his head, one grabbing his ear and the other a fist at his jaw, he felt the pride pouring out of her, flooding the room and his senses with it. It was the same roaring cacophony that had thrummed down into his core the day Satan was created.

“No, you listen here,” she spat, the flecks of spittle hitting his face when she bared her teeth in speech. “I am not your prisoner. You can’t control me. **Stop** degrading me or I will burn this entire realm to the ground and everything you love with it.”

* * *

He swatted her hands away like toothpicks, his expression inscrutable, and strode away from her and into a back room. A sound like thunder followed, but she couldn’t decide whether he was saying something in Infernal speech, or if he had kicked something like a metal, water tank.

She focused on bringing her heartrate back under control. With no small amount of schadenfreude, she heard a knick knack fall over and shatter on the floor behind her.

“What was that?” he asked, a dark warning from the back room into which he’d disappeared.

“I haven’t moved!” She touched her throat. It was sore again. At least this time it was from shouting and not from Leviathan’s hand around it.

She picked at the fabric wrapped around her waist, and fiddled with a button that protruded from the knot she’d made of her dress. Was he keeping her waiting on purpose? Was this a tactic? Or did she have him on the ropes and he needed time to think? ‘Fuck, what do _I_ even think?’

Returning with a tray of tea in hand, wings away but his demonic finery still on display, Lucifer pulled a sofa chair after him. They both ignored the tinkle of glass that followed in its wake. At least he wasn’t sitting next to her. She wasn’t sure what she’d do if he was too near.

The tray was set to rest next to her on the couch and he sat across from her. Gracefully, he poured them both tea, as if nothing had happened between them and the broken glass on the floor was there for decoration. 

She looked hard at his torn sleeve cuff to remind herself that she’d tried to stab him only moments before. 

Without a word between them, Lucifer fixed her a cup, and slowly her shoulders receded from their place around her ears. It was unexpected that he remembered how she liked her tea. Guilt tingled around the periphery of her anger, and she set his broken horn down on the tray: a peace offering that stung when she separated it from her blood-tacky skin.

“All right my little commandant—”

“Excuse you?” she said immediately. Suspicion was warranted here.

“You don’t like the title?”

“The title is fine, but to my knowledge, I’m not _your_ anything.”

“You belong to at least one of my brothers,” he said, leaning back in his chair and propping his ankle up on his knee with practiced ease. “My brothers belong to me. Therefore you belong to me.”

“I don’t belong to anyone,” she said, staring him down.

“Do they know that?” he asked, congenially, as if she hadn’t just stabbed him and pelted him with his own bric-à-brac. 

His calm demeanor made her wish that some of the things she’d thrown had been cursed or haunted. “They certainly should by now because I keep saying it.”

“How is it then that I have spent all week trying to keep Mammon and Belphegor from covertly maiming one another whenever I turn my back?”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” she said and lifted her teacup in her good hand, leaving the saucer on the tray. “I can’t say it any more bluntly than I have and I made it clear that I won’t be saying I belong to them.” The fingers of her free hand flexed outward with her exasperation and she ignored the stinging. “I have had full conversations about this because this seems to be a _thing_.”

“I see,” he said slowly, taking in her distress regarding the topic. “Mammon, I could understand, but Belphegor…he’s very specific about wording and manipulating it.” 

“Not that it’s really any of your business, but I’ve refused every time.” She kept from crossing her arms for comfort and blew on her tea instead. This was not what they were supposed to be talking about. They were supposed to discuss either sending her home or not treating her like a high security prisoner, not whether his personal army had the hots for her.

“There’s something you’re not telling me,” he said. The colour in his eyes had stabilized, but she still saw peeks of the gradient red. It reminded her of when he’d tipped her chair backward in the kitchen to inspect her bruises and bite marks. He’d taken his time making her squirm when he found none of them remained.

She glanced back down at the bloody horn on the tray. “…Okay, yesterday I may have changed wording, but the intent still stands.”

“You’re telling me that you duped the seventh Lord of the Devildom with a turn of phrase.”

“I wouldn’t put it that way.”

“Then how would you put it?”

“I said I’d never want to come between him and Beelzebub and left it at that. So, definitely not a yes.”

It should have been insulting when Lucifer dropped his face into his hand and gave an exasperated laugh, but now it was just par for the course, and she took another sip of her tea. “Hold still, you still have bits of pottery on you,” she said while picking out a shard that remained caught in the unruly waves of his hair. “Sorry about your vase…and your jacket.”

“Not to worry, my armor is not in my dress but in my manner.” He laughed harder into his gloved fist. “And, by now, I should know not to bring you anywhere I don’t want broken.”

“Gee thanks.” The teacup was her shield now, and she leaned back into the couch to drink from it slowly. “So, care to explain what you were aiming for in the hallway the other night?”

“I beg your pardon?” Lucifer asked.

“Good, beg then,” she said flatly, waiting. Her lips betrayed her as they tried to quirk upwards. 

Eyes narrowed, Lucifer let her order slide but his fingers tapped obviously on the chair arm. “It’s important for anyone, at any level of command, to be able to do so effectively and at any time.”

“Even when they’ve just come back from the brink of death again?”

“Especially.”

She was nearing the bottom of her cup now. “Your methods are too harsh to be effective for me.” 

He didn’t reply, choosing instead to drink and look over the broken items of his room and sigh.

Her cup finally empty, she broke the silence that had started to grow between them. “At some point I’d like to talk to you about Mammon. Would you be available to talk about that before the party tomorrow?”

A scowl quickly covered Lucifer’s features. “Has he been inappropriate with you after I _spoke_ with him?”

“No, no,” she said, taken aback at the abrupt change of direction in her intended topic. “I just wanted to talk about finances. Although, perhaps we should also discuss discipline. You know I’m not a fan of how harsh you are with him.” She paused, mentally shaking herself. She wasn’t a fan of how harsh he could be with Mammon and yet only a few minutes ago he’d dragged her by her limbs like a rag doll. How easy it was to forget when he put his gentile exterior back on.

Lucifer pursed his lips. “I do what must be done.”

“Lucifer…” she sighed. She wanted to just crawl into his bed, steal it because he was being stupid, and make him sleep on the couch. He’d have to get Diavolo if he wanted to remove her and it would serve him right. She looked around, trying to find the words now that her raw throat and wet clothing were taking up the fore of her thoughts. “I’m sure your activities together can be...cathartic,” she said carefully, “but there is nowhere that he doesn’t receive criticism. I know I’m new here, but as a more objective viewer…” She looked down into her empty cup for answers while her breathing came in deep and unsettled draws. “He’s not going to last, Lucifer.”

Tiredness filled her bones as the dampness of her clothing cloyed at her skin. She set down her teacup. How had she gotten in the lake anyway? That was definitely something she’d need to discuss with Satan.

The silence grew between them again while Lucifer mulled over her words; at least, she hoped he was thinking them over. For all she knew, he was determining how best to couch this fight between them as a gentle debate in his next report to Diavolo.

“Make a pact with me,” Lucifer said. He still had yet to set down his own cup.

“What?” she asked. Clearly, she’d misheard him.

“I said, ‘make a pact with me’.”

She frowned, suspicion growing in the pit of her stomach. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree, and Satan had tried to make a pact with her purely out of spite. What was Lucifer plotting? “Why?”

“You say you don’t belong to any of my brothers, and they regularly fail in their endeavours to protect or woo you. You will be mine. You will be adequately protected and they will stop fighting amongst themselves for your affections.”

“No, thank you,” she said and eyed the teapot rather than look at him; she wasn’t sure if she could keep the distaste from showing on her face if she did.

“How unfortunate for you,” he said, and by the time she could inhale he was in her space, his knee brushed against the outside of her thigh where he knelt on the couch and crowded her. With her chin in one of his hands, he forced her to meet his eyes, while his other arm blocked her view of the door, braced on the back of the couch near her temple. “Because it’s **too late** now. I will not be your possession, but **you** **_will_ ** **belong to me.”**

 **“** I don’t need you,” she said bluntly, while trying to stare into his eyes without actually seeing them. 

**“** That’s not what you were moaning the other night,” he said, his devious smile and soft lips far too close to her face. “In fact, I remember you begging me not to stop.”

 **“** I’m not your pawn, Lucifer,” she said and sucked back the saliva in her mouth, preparing to spit in his face.

He promptly released her chin in favour of covering her mouth.

No glove, she realized. There was an uncomfortable feeling that she couldn’t place and it distracted her from his missing accessory. It was like a rusty sprocket inside her trying to turn, cogs catching and clipping against the gear rather than moving with it. She squirmed against his hold on her face. “Fuck you,” she said into his palm.

Her cold, wet clothing, that before had brought goosebumps to her flesh, now felt too tight and too hot. Somehow, she was going to suffocate under his hand even with her nose uncovered. Panic rose in her and she struggled against him in earnest. It felt too much like the _click_ of command when she’d ordered Asmodeus. 

Bringing her thumbs up to Lucifer’s face, he leaned away before she could gouge his eyes.

The single eyebrow he arched at her said, ‘how rude of you,’ while he captured her injured hand. “Then don’t be a pawn,” he said as though it were the simplest of tasks. He brought the offending hand back up to his face to gently kiss the back of her hand, supporting it by her wrist rather than press his fingers into the wound there. “Consider being my queen instead. We could bring the Devildom to its knees.”

“ _No_.” Her heart was hammering wildly and she hoped it didn’t show on her face. She needed to look strong. There had to be no crack in her façade for him to target. 

“You’ve certainly got guts, don’t you?” he asked, still holding her hand, now cupping it in his own but lower, at a height more comfortable for her. “I’ve always found that aspect about you irritating.”

She remained still while he reassessed her from head to toe, despite him practically being in her lap.

“But as irritating as it is, it’s even **more** endearing.”

That was not what she’d expected. None of this was what she’d expected. She looked away from him, uncomfortable with the praise. Shouldn’t her second refusal have hurt his pride further? Why did he seem to love and hate their arguments in equal measure? Why was she still sitting here?

“Perhaps one more until you come to your senses,” he said softly, and pulled her forward by her wrist, bringing it back toward his hip. He slid his free hand into the hair at the base of her skull and kissed her deeply.

She wanted to _want_ to push him away, but something else in her remembered how gently he’d touched her before, worshiped her as he’d bruised and marked her body. The taste of him was the same.

He was the first to pull away, and she knew her eyes were glazed with need and emotion.

“That was the last one,” she said firmly, when her mouth decided to work again. Looking down to her right, she found her teacup already refilled, and once more she lifted it without the saucer. “I don’t want you to touch me any more.” She could hear the conviction in her own voice and knew it was what she wanted. “I can’t trust you.”

Lucifer, returned to his own seat, raised a gloved hand to his chest. “What would make you say such a thing?”

“I never know whether you’re going to injure me or pet me. I’m done. Don’t touch me again unless you plan to kill me.”

Over the rim of her teacup she watched the tightness around his eyes as his hand fell back down to his armrest. ‘Surprise?’ she wondered. ‘No, more wounded than that.’ It wasn’t a look she’d seen on him before.

For the first time since she’d told him what she thought of him, they held each other’s gaze without trying to light one another on fire through sheer force of will. There was an understanding.

“I will never raise my hand to harm you again,” Lucifer said solemnly.

She felt the corner of her mouth twitch. “Give me your word properly if you mean it,” she said. His hand wasn’t her only worry. There couldn’t be any ambiguity.

The pensive moment he took was what told her he wasn’t being flippant when he finally answered. “Do you know of what you ask?” He seemed far away when he spoke, thinking of something other than her.

“Are you able to give it?” she asked carefully. The art of negotiation was a deadly thing with a demon. With Lucifer, it could only be more so. How hard could it be to promise not to harm her?

Breathing a deep sigh, he set down his teacup and saucer and picked up his broken horn, tossing it a couple times in his gloved hand as if weighing it. “It is not the result I was hoping for...but it'll do. Let Osiris and Ra attend,” he said solemnly. 

The windows on either side of Lucifer’s bed lit up, first one side in red and then the other in blue. It made her skin crawl, as if two large eyes, each wider than two of the latticed windows, were peering in at her.

“Give me your arm and I am made as ye,” Lucifer said, never looking away from her as he dragged the broken horn across his ungloved palm. “I am the spirit, divided in his two halves.”

She swallowed hard, suddenly uncertain of what she’d gotten herself into. Was this the same as when Satan had left protections on her skin in his blood? Even without wind and magic swirling around them, it seemed more rigid and severe. Her eyes flitted to either side of Lucifer to look again at the large, looming balls of light pressed against his windows.

Her distraction meant she didn’t notice him reach for her until her hand was already atop his open, bloody palm, the amputated horn the only thing keeping them apart.

“Let any unwanted harm that befalls you, by my action or folly, fall to me threefold. Never shall this covenant be broken once healed.”

“Ah!” she squeaked in surprise and alarm as he squeezed her hand in his, meshing their flesh and blood together. There was a flash of light behind her eyes and she raised her free hand to shield herself but it gave her no reprieve. She was blind and she blinked rapidly, trying to clear her eyes, as she had so many times before when her mind couldn't comprehend the information in front of it. Remaining still, she took slow deep breaths; she wasn’t a pheasant to be flushed out, panicking and fleeing blindly, before being picked off. 

The vague hum of her demons were somewhere nearby in the void around her. If she chose to, she could attempt to call them. The idea of testing their loyalty to her stalled her reaching.

By the time she’d blinked the bedroom back into focus, the eerie peepers at the windows were gone. “I—Um.”

This time the smile Lucifer gave her was soft; it was the way Satan looked at stray kittens. “I will not underestimate you again,” Lucifer said. “On the Devildom’s stage you may be a powerless pawn, but in this house you are a prime mover, what keeps our world from falling apart. Do not underestimate that either."

The heavy double doors burst open behind her but she covered her flinch by removing her hand from Lucifer’s and setting the makeshift dagger back on the tea tray.

* * *

The sight that met Beelzebub and Asmodeus served only to confuse them. 

Broken glass littered the room, along with chunks of metal and ceramics. Their mistress was dishevelled and bloody, Lucifer was missing half of a horn and coated in ash, but both of them were sitting calmly: having tea. 

“Malebolge's bolgias, Lucifer!” Beel said, and moved faster than her human eyes could hope to track.

“It’s alright,” she said, as he lifted her into his arms and away from the couch. “We made up.” She spoke calmly, but he’d seen how shaken she was.

“I’m not angry that you made up,” Beelzebub said through gritted teeth. He turned his back on Lucifer to stomp back to the hall and kicked one of the tall doors off its hinges while he was at it.

“Stop loitering in the doorway and come in, Asmodeus,” Lucifer said, when Beelzebub’s heavy steps could no longer be heard. He knew he was composed enough now for company despite the debris that surrounded and covered him.

Asmodeus gave a low whistle. “Bit of a helion, isn’t she?”

“Practically a fury,” Lucifer said without amusement. He leaned forward and picked up the broken bit of horn only to toss it to Asmodeus. “See what you can do about having that made into something useful for her.”

“Are you sure?” Asmodeus asked, askanced. He’d pulled his head back in line with his shoulders and side-eyed Lucifer. “We’re expected at the castle tomorrow night. It would be faster and easier to reattach it than the pain of regrowing it.”

“I didn’t think I would need to repea—” Lucifer began, before reconsidering. “Thank you for your concern. I appreciate it but I prefer it this way.”

Asmodeus practically beamed. It was like watching a wilted plant straighten itself after receiving rain. “Hmm hmm!” he sang to himself. “I’ll make something fitting.” His smile was sweet as he turned and sauntered away.

Lucifer couldn’t help but smile as well. How infuriating.


	107. Beel’s Labyrinth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor struggles with the fact that his twin kept him from their mistress when she was in danger. Going so far as to have three of their older brothers restrain him.
> 
> When he does eventually get to them, the day doesn't get any easier.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarcophatic for their beta reading!

Mammon answered his D.D.D. with difficulty, but he managed to dig the device out of his pocket while holding down Belphegor’s tail. “Oi, ya dummy, quit strugglin’. Beel says he has her and she’s fine.”

Instantly, the cacophony of noise in the room ended. Belphegor had gone limp under his older brothers, waiting for them to roll off of his limbs. His tail “accidentally” slapped Mammon in the side while he shrugged Satan and Leviathan off of him. They were too slow. “ **_Get_ ** **off me!** ”

On his feet without another word, Belphegor was ready to storm Lucifer’s room and let the building around them be ground down into nothing from the force of his explosive mood. But the slightest pull on the tab at the back of his jacket kept him from charging forward; he swung his arm back to knock away whichever of his so-called brothers had decided to lay their hands on him again. At least they’d had to transform to keep him in place.

The frustration giving way to heartache in Mammon’s eyes was almost enough to bleed off some of Belphegor’s anger. “Don’t go pickin’ a fight with Lucifer until you’ve at least seen her.” Mammon said, catching the back-handed fist before it hit him in the face.

It was the contrast of Mammon’s appearance overall that gave Belphegor pause: each strap and buckle were in their place, meticulous, and yet he hadn’t bothered to regenerate his body. Everywhere that had faced the outpouring of Lucifer’s frustration was damaged. Mammon’s skin was peeled back. Muscle and tendon peeked out in places, dancing along his burnt forearms and hollow, clenching jaw. Maybe he wanted to feel the sting of it still? 

It was clear he hadn’t bothered to shield himself and Belphegor couldn’t bring himself to feel pity for him. ‘Good. He deserves to feel it for letting Lucifer anywhere near her when he’s like that. For keeping me from her. All of us even.’

“She won’t forgive you if you don't go see her first…” Leviathan said while rubbing his jacket sleeve over his face. He ignored the hand up Satan offered in favour of scrunching his knees to his chest and leaning back into the tiny corner made by the support beam and the wall. 

“ _Tch!_ ” Belphegor threw off Mammon’s loose grip on his fist and started down the corridor, this time in the opposite direction. It wasn’t Lucifer he was the most angry with right now anyway. It was Beel who had told them to hold him back.

First, he’d been driven squirrely by some fuckery with his magic, then he was scolded by the object of his affections for his concern, and now his twin had betrayed him, thought him untrustworthy when it came to rescuing their mistress. An insidious part of him whispered that Beel was still trying to take her for his own. 

When he found whatever idiot cult had decided to play at diabolism, and pulled the listless magic from his bones, he would see to it that they’d never leave the bolgia dedicated to sorrow and tears for as long as the energy in their souls lasted.

If she weren’t still in the building Belphegor would have razed it to smoldering ruins with Lucifer inside on principle alone, but first he needed to get to Beel and see to her health. 

Belphegor’s fingers tapped restlessly at his thigh when he reached the wall where the door to his room _should_ have been. Walking back and forth, he took stock of the lack of entrance. It wasn’t an illusion. All evidence of the room was gone, even the worn down carpet where the door should have opened onto appeared as bright as the neighbouring patches. With a groan, Belphegor recognized that Beel had gone to ground.

Raking his hands through his hair he sighed loudly. “What a waste of time,” he said aloud. At least he knew Beel hadn’t absconded with her entirely, not unless he’d grown craftier while they’d been apart and now made decoy redoubts to hide his spoils. It was highly unlikely.

With a heavy sigh, Belphegor realized he couldn’t tear through the wall, not when he didn’t know where she was in the room. It wouldn’t be safe, and would only serve to keep Beel on high alert, whether the entrance he cut into the wall was near her or not. 

Belphegor stuffed his hands in his pockets and growled his discontent, stalking away and to the end of the hallway where he pushed open the window. This was such a hassle. Why couldn’t anything with their mistress be easy?

The things he put up with for the two of them. He didn’t bother to close the window behind him when he slipped out onto the ledge, instead he immediately lanced his clawed fingertips into the stone siding and began climbing. ‘Let the acid rain get in next time it pours,’ he thought. There was still a good chance he’d level the building before the day was out. Leviathan was likely already packing his hoard in case the roof mysteriously caught fire. Again.

If it weren’t for the unnatural lack of lethargy, Belphegor would’ve cut away the entire wall to save time, or had Asmodeus do it as a distraction dummy, but this long route might actually be more efficient. Even if he had to expend more energy at the start a careful and quiet entrance would serve his objective best. 

More often than not, he looked as spineless and out of shape as Leviathan, but there was no escaping Beel when he started any new type of fitness regimen. For once, as he pulled himself up over the ledge of the gutter, Belphegor didn’t mourn that fact.

The hard part over with, he crept up the incline of the roof toward the dormer windows of his shared bedroom. No light shone out of the windows, but he hadn’t expected it to. 

He prodded at the glass and sighed when he felt magic push solidly back. Beel never learned; he always reverted to this when he had to hide something without time to think. 

At least the Formerly Anti-Lucifer Club had been useful for something: Satan had been quick to teach them both how to dispel difficult glyphs of warding, and now, after disarming a number of Lucifer’s without setting them off, it had become second nature. The window popped open without fuss and the magic shielding it fizzled and smoked, rolling past him and down the slope of the roof, into the front garden.

Simple but annoying, it was now a matter of making it through each tiny sealed room Beel had created. The labyrinth of cells was constructed to disorient and trap if entered. Belphegor still wasn’t certain that there was ever a predetermined design to them. It was created in the same manner Asmodeus chose his colour schemes and dimensions: instinct and a natural talent. They concealed as necessary while highlighting and perplexing with other aspects. Effective in the short term, but never meticulous, not when it came to thinking several moves ahead. It was a heavy reliance on gut feeling.

Stepping onto the mezzanine was simple enough but Belphegor was brought to a halt immediately by another wall of magic. ‘Such a pain.’ He couldn’t even say it aloud or he’d alert Beel that he was already inside the maze. No need to have it collapsed on him if he could avoid it.

That wouldn’t be so difficult to deal with, except that he could feel Beel’s gut feelings. The constant agitation thrashed inside him, rushing his movements and making them jerky. He took a deep breath and tried to even himself out. 

Peeling back one new section led on to yet another and another cell, and at each stage Belphegor simply patted the loose magic back on itself so that it stuck and healed behind him. If it became unstable, eventually Beel would notice

A squeal under his foot froze Belphegor in place. Slowly, he lifted his lazily tied combat boot up. Provisions. 

Snacks stashed between walls meant Beel considered this a long haul. Siege mentality. Spider hole tactics were now a distinct possibility. Nearly every cell would be stocked with something, no matter how small. When Beel couldn’t withstand his hunger any longer, and it drew him closer and closer to the surface of his mud nest, he would gorge himself along the way and devour any intruders during his patrols. 

Why couldn’t they have telepathy like other entities created together but apart? It would be so much easier than this deadly game of hide and seek.

At least it meant Beel would be roaming when his hunger grew too great. He knew not to be at her side in case he lost control.

A few well placed tugs and tears would send the architecture sliding into disarray and reveal their bedroom, but it would only send Beel into flight again. So, he plodded on, each step as slow and controlled as he could manage against his own need to hurry and Beel’s shared and constant agitation sloshing around inside him. 

Eventually, when Belphegor had dodged the last crinkly bag of smoked newt jerky, he stepped out onto the main floor. The air was different here, less stale. He frowned. Now that they actually had something worthwhile to protect, he’d need to convince Beel to make his walls transparent, or better yet able to transmit vibration and movement. If it wasn’t impenetrable, then it should at least give forewarning of intruders. 

But that was the least of his problems; the easy part of his objective was now over, and as angry as he was, he needed to be the calm one if he was going to get any closer. Adding to Beel’s strife would only make things worse.

The fear and anger from across their bond was enough to drown in and the closer Belphegor got the worse it became. Despite the short distance from the stairwell to the main room, he paused every few steps, trying to dissipate the urgency constantly lapping at his body. 

Taking a few deep breaths before continuing once more, he tried forcefully to soothe Beel’s side of their bond, shifting soft feelings and comfort his way. The dark wall of turbulence he felt didn’t absorb any of it. 

He hadn’t expected it to work, but he continued trying as he crept closer in the darkened room. This was so much worse than he’d anticipated. An orange light bled through cracks of stacked furniture around Beel’s bed, now shoved in the corner: a tiny fortress.

Circling around the provisional wall, and his own upturned bed, Belphegor skirted past a stack of trunks. The tunnels and cells overhead created a capstone over the makeshift fortification, blocking out the light that would otherwise escape to create a glowing nucleus of heat and frenetic magic.

“Beel," he called softly, "I'm here now. Why don't you talk to me?" 

"Leave the lights off," Beel said, his voice low enough to border on the decibels he favoured for infernal speech.

The “wall” in front of Belphegor, made up of his mattress, looked too cozy to disturb so he pulled aside the trunks. He had to focus on looking for heat frequencies rather than light with how Beel bleached the area with orange glow. Much of their mistress was hidden by Beel’s frame around her and the radiant warmth he lent her, but Belphegor’s shoulders dropped with relief. She seemed uninjured. 

A deep thrum ran up Belphegor’s feet, and up through the trunks into his hands as he shuffled closer: a clear warning. Gnawing anger and suspicion were still rife within Beel and it was palpable in the air and in their bond. It felt like Beel’s associations with burn marinara sauce: foul and acrid. 

"Hey," Belphegor said softly while he created a pocket of space between himself and his own flipped bed. He knelt at Beel’s bedside, knees tucked under the frame, so that he could reach his hand out to touch their human. Her eyes didn’t meet his. They were glossy and unseeing and what air was in his lungs felt like it would rupture his chest. He couldn’t remember how to breathe.

Beel's arm was immediately between their mistress and Belphegor’s reaching hand. It was only then that her attention was drawn to him. 

‘Alive,’ was all he could think. For the briefest of moments, he fully understood the wild look in Mammon’s eyes the day he had killed her. Pulling at the shadows of the room, Belphegor cloaked himself in a dark cocoon. He needed to collect himself. There was no helping them if he couldn’t balance his own emotions, and so he struggled to soothe his own fear and anger.

Banishing the memory of her dead eyes, Belphegor breathed slowly, trying to put himself in his twin's shoes. This was a probable reaction to a threat with how deeply Beel cared for her, not pleasant, but it had always been a possibility. 

When was the last time it had been this bad? Belphegor couldn’t remember any longer. Eyeing the beefy arm before him, and the one beneath their mistress, he saw that Beel’s demonic markings inked out the red of his tattooed bicep, strangling it in favour of producing spikes similar to those of his jacket. They protruded from his skin like carapace bumps, half lost between forms. _That_ was beyond what he’d ever imagined to find. Just how far had Lucifer pushed him?

Before he could begin to talk, their mistress reached out and snagged the cuff of Belphegor’s sleeve, pulling at him until Beel moved enough to allow him onto the bed. 

What the lady wanted, the lady got. ‘Good to know.’ She’d likely saved him a few hours of cajoling.

Settling in next to her on his side, Belphegor didn't bother kicking off his boots. In the grand scheme of things muddy boots didn’t matter. Right now, he needed to focus on slow, measured movements and even breathing, both for Beel and for himself. 

There was no way Beel would leave her in pain, but there was still a need to check for himself. It was nearly overwhelming and he honestly didn’t know if the emotion belonged to him or both of them. He wanted to run his hands over her and kiss everything better, before falling asleep with her in his arms, but it was always best to move quietly and carefully until Beel had been soothed, at least if he wanted to keep his arms. “Why’s your clothing all wet?” he whispered instead, his hand unmoving from where she’d pulled it to her middle. 

“Magicked myself through the lake accidentally,” she said, and pulled the pillow over her head.

Belphegor looked to Beel for confirmation but his eyes were still fixed on his little spoon. “Beel, you need to rein it in a little, you’re blinding her.” It was no surprise that she was shielding her face. Then again, it was possible she was simply embarrassed. If the atmosphere weren’t so tense he was sure he would’ve laughed at her blunder.

The light dimmed minutely and Beel pulled her even tighter against himself, wrapping his leg over her protectively. It wasn’t a subtle shift and Belphegor saw and felt it for what it was: fear. 

With the way Beel was curling around her, it made it impossible for Belphegor to keep his hand where she held it. Agitation buzzed at Belphegor’s insides at being forced away. This wasn’t right. They were both here. ‘Beel _should_ be calming down.’ 

When he closed his eyes and reached out, immersing himself completely in the bond between them, he couldn’t even find the drum of hunger that constantly beat on the other side of the line, only anger. Beel was nowhere near able to talk yet. It was a miracle he’d managed to tell him to keep the lights off.

A sneeze from beneath the pillow chose his path forward. “Hey Princess, we need to get you out of these wet clothes.” He carefully moved the pillow away from her face, hyper-aware of Beel’s watchful eyes while he did so.

She gave a small grunt of inconvenience before giving him a soft “okay.” But when she moved to get up, a deep growl rolled out of Beel and she went limp. It was like watching a pup bare its throat and belly to a wolf. A part of him both loved and hated it.

Examination of that would have to wait; he was missing something. The exasperation in Beel’s wordless speech didn’t make sense.

“Why don’t you fill me in, hmm?” Belphegor asked, laying himself flat on his belly with his cheek pressed against the mattress in order to put them eye to eye. “What has him so tied up that he’s lost the will to eat?”

Her eyes went wide before she shrank in on herself.

‘Fuck. Wrong question.’ This was beginning to feel like one of Leviathan’s personal interaction games.

There was a small squeak of protest, and then Belphegor was left to look at Beel’s wings. He’d dipped his arm the rest of the way around her and rolled away, shielding her completely from sight. 

“Hey, what's wrong with you?” Belphegor asked, poking his twin in the spine.

Beel’s wings buzzed violently. When they finally stopped, and only a few twitches of wingtip occasionally struck the mattress, Belphegor was able to see the deep gouges that had been sliced into the mattress. This wasn’t going to be easy. 

Always the mediator, Beel was usually so effortlessly open about his feelings and could drag them both out of the dark, but when he was upset it was so easy for both of them to flounder in it. At least they had their trump card to pull them both out this time.

“Are you going to let her get sick because you won’t let her change?” Belphegor asked, making sure his voice was sulky rather than accusatory. The less he added to Beel’s defensiveness the better. “You can keep her warm for a while, but what happens when you have to get up to eat?”

Through their bond he felt a stubborn push, like a slow mudslide, trying to force him away. “I’m here to help, so I can’t leave,” he said a bit louder than before, ensuring she could hear him in English before he pushed his own discomfort and neediness back against the wave of discontent.

He took a chance and raised his hand to Beel’s back again, this time rubbing gently along his spine; the tiniest chord of relief could be heard in his breathing at the touch. “Hmm,” Belphegor said. “I think it’s going to take the two of us to cheer him up. If we don’t work together who knows how long he’ll last without eating.”

There was an annoyed huff on the other side of Beel and Belphegor had to quickly remove his hand from Beel’s back to avoid being sliced by one of the wings. ‘Don’t upset the lady. Got it.’

Despite Beel being the one clutching at her like a security blanket, she still managed to sound the more sullen of the two of them. “He’s mad ‘cause I won’t let him heal me,” she said, raising her voice. 

It took Belphegor a moment to digest her words. He blinked a number of times while trying to comprehend why she wouldn’t want to be healed. He’d rarely met a human that didn’t want to be healed, and this didn’t seem like a case of mortification of the flesh. “Do you have a good reason to want to remain injured?” he asked, careful to keep his voice even and curious, instead of giving into the churning mass of anger that radiated out of Beel and into him. He swallowed it down.

‘She’s fine,’ had been the promise to himself that had repeated through his head ever since he’d heard Lucifer’s roar. During their mad dash home he’d been terrified. What if she had met her final end? The thought had gnashed at him while Leviathan, Mammon, and Satan had held him down. ‘I’m definitely going to burn the house down,’ he thought with a solemn certainty.

Minutes ticked by without an answer from her. Just when he thought he’d have to try a new tactic, she said, “I’m tired of there never being any evidence, of everything just disappearing.” 

He knew that everyone should want to heal but the way she said it knocked the air from his lungs. 

Her whisper barely reached him when she said, “Then we all pretend like it never happened.”

“That _could_ make sense,” Belphegor said diplomatically. He brought his hands up, this time to rub soft circles around the muscles that fed into the humeral plates on Beel’s back; he knew the chitinous sclerites that armoured the joints and attached Beel’s wings to his body were usually the first thing to cramp when he was tense for too long. “...but it would depend on how hurt you are.” Slowly, very slowly the muscle and ligaments under his hands began to relax and Beel's breathing relaxed with it. Bingo. That was the crux of the problem.

“I’m fine,” she said. 

How did she manage to sound so snotty and so authoritative at the same time? 

Beel’s creaking wing joints were drowned out by his Infernal growl. ‘Blood!’ 

The sound gave off the stench of death and the way the fluid would thicken and stick to itself, creating clots instead of splatters when it fell. Belphegor was on his feet, immediately, shifting his weight from foot to foot uselessly on the mattress, his tail swishing behind him.

“You’re exaggerating!” she exclaimed, trying to shout Beel down. “It’s a tiny cut!”

‘Two tantrums to deal with,’ Belphegor thought. He rubbed both his hands over his face. At least Beel wasn’t rampaging through the market squares, taking out his anger, via his stomach, on every food cart in the city.

There was a squawk of discontent, and Belphegor could only guess that Beel had squeezed her when she’d tried to struggle away.

“Too bad! It’s going to stay like that,” she said, her words snarled. “You’ve taken away scars I didn’t even get while I was here! Keep this up and I’ll make sure it stays open for the rest of the school ye—”

Lethargy was finally beginning to suck itself back into Belphegor. He hadn’t noticed its slow return before, but now he shrugged his shoulders into the comfortable feeling. There’d been no loss of power while it was away, but being without the mantle he associated it with was unnatural. When he opened his eyes and looked down, Beel had spun her around in his hold so that she was a little spoon bent backward.

His whispered words to her were covered by the rustle of his wings, but her deepening frown and narrowing eyes made it clear that she wasn’t having any of it. They were at an impasse.

Belphegor could sort of make out her words by reading her lips. “...finished...Lucifer...dungeon...you.” Whatever it was, she was adamant. Unfortunately, so was Beel. 

Maybe he would be better off waiting them out and sleeping now that he could. They were talking now. It might work itself out.

“DON’T YOU DARE!” she shouted.

Well, that squashed the sleeping option. She’d started struggling after her exclamation, which only made Beel try to huddle more tightly around her. 

Belphegor could feel his twin’s desperation to protect. If this went on much longer he’d accidentally suffocate her. They’d need to coax him down from his anxiety before their argument was going to get anywhere. “Come on, Beel. She’s not in any danger in here with us,” Belphegor said, before yawning. “Let’s get her something dry and warm to wear, I’ll grab some snacks, and we can all talk this ou—”

“ **OFF!** ”

The world around Belphegor went orange as the force of what felt like a truck collided with him. The soft mattress of his own bed hadn’t cushioned the landing much, but at least he’d struck the overturned bed rather than the wall.

He _should_ have been groaning under the weight of Beel on top of him. He _should_ have been considering going to sleep now that he was flat on a bed. Usually, sleeping away the terrible feeling of betrayal that was coursing through Beel _would_ be his first consideration before guilt dissuaded him, but he was already shoving Beel off of himself and marching over to their human’s side.

One hand on her shoulder, his other hand raised with a finger pointing, ready to shout, he stopped short at her dumbstruck expression. She was leaning to the side, legs partially folded under her, with dust coating one of her arms and blood spatter coating the other, absolute shock written over her face.

And then he felt it: a lack of despondency and a level of vitality he hadn’t felt in ages. He knelt on the bed and placed his hands on either side of her face, drawing her attention back to him while the light behind him faded to black. “Do it again.”

“I don’t-don’t know how,” she said, voice cracking with emotion. Her watery eyes matched her uncertain tone. “Beel?” She moved to stand but whatever strength she’d had seemed to have abandoned her now.

“Hold on,” Belphegor said, and pulled her toward him and the edge of Beel’s bed. He turned them so that she sat sideways across his lap and he could keep her upright as a sluggishness, not of his making, weighed down her eyelids. “I think,” Belphegor said, looking at Beel who had only just rolled over to watch them, “I found my magic pilferer.”

“Didn’t mean to...” she said groggily into his neck.

He felt something warm and wet slide down to his collarbone and he stiffened. 'That better not be drool.' Well, she was cute. He’d forgive her.

A glance at Beel told him it wasn’t drool. The heads of his eyebrows had risen so much that they’d created a tension that his usual frown lacked. The corners of his mouth were curled down and his lower lip pushed up with an involuntary trembling that was usually reserved for spilled ice cream.

Belphegor lifted his hand to stroke her hair. He could feel it when all three of them began to relax. The warmth of her melting into his arms, and the distress from Beel slowly began to uncoil its hold on both its vessels, was blissful. It was difficult to keep his wits amidst the unrestrained relief he felt.

“Why am I so tired?” she asked after a sniffle escaped her.

“From what I hear, you _did_ just go toe to toe with Lucifer.” That alone would be enough for anyone, but he could feel something else, something that tugged at him though her grasp on him was limp. Was this how she had bruised him while snuggled up to Satan, by stealing bits of his power?

After a sigh that Leviathan would have been proud of, she shrugged off his suggestion. 

“Can Beel come back over?” Belphegor asked and felt hopefulness grip his twin. It was practically a high frequency whine.

Despite her nodded assent, there was a tension to her body when Beel’s weight shifted the mattress, but it quickly disappeared when Belphegor tipped them unceremoniously onto Beel, using him as their personal recliner.

She seemed more forthcoming now, and he would need that if he was going to sway her or Beel to see reason. There was an unsteady truce right now, but if he didn’t understand at least one side of the issue, his words would bounce off of them without leaving any impression. If only his eyelids would stop drooping when Beel rocked them back and forth. 

Fighting against the returning pull of sleep, Belphegor asked, "If you had to pick one thing for Beel to heal, what would it be and why?"

"Ankle," she said softly and without hesitation. "It's okay but sore and I need to be able to run."

That wasn't a no. There was middle ground to be found.

"I can do that," Beel whispered. He was clearly trying to match her hushed tone.

She shifted to cuddle closer to them both, her fingers grabbing into the fabric of his sweater.

"Thank you," Belphegor said and nuzzled the top of her head for a few moments. "And what would be the most important thing not to heal and why?" 

There was silence for a time, and it dragged painfully given how badly Belphegor wanted to sleep; her hands fisted tightly in his sweater was all that kept him from breaking the quiet. Who wouldn’t want to be healed? She made no sense. _This_ made no sense. He needed to sleep so that he could think clearly. 

Even as a distant descendant of Lilith, borrowing of powers unaided was almost unheard of: nearly every human required chants, or at least circles or fetishes. She could barely command a mote _with_ all of those. Why hadn’t he been able to tell it was her meddling with him? Had she known?

"Can healing skip spots?" she asked.

"I have good aim," Beel said immediately. His eagerness rushed his words and stilled his rocking motions. 

Belphegor could feel the barely harnessed need to tend her, but no one would need their bond to recognize it. Beel practically radiated his emotions. It didn’t surprise him one bit that Beel had stopped moving inorder to restrain his urge to remedy.

"And why?" Belphegor prodded further, jiggling her in his lap with a repetitive rise and fall of his leg. He stopped jostling her when she inhaled sharply.

"I...I’m not sure what to do anymore. If I should keep it.” She inhaled deeply and held it before letting the air out slowly until she must’ve been dizzy with it. “If it heals then I can't undo Lucifer's oath...and I’m not sure I want...I don’t know what it means. I don’t really remember."

It felt like the only one of them actually breathing was her. Belphegor could feel Beel’s emotions fluctuating wildly and they’d both become living statues.

“Huh...I didn't expect that,” Belphegor said noncommittally when he realized he’d been silent too long, and then, nudging her, he tried to add some levity. “You got my hopes up too high. Here I thought you had something to end the world.” 

It _felt_ like the world was ending. What new layer of attachment had Lucifer bound to her? What right did he have to any bond with her?

Her choked laughter was enough to reduce some of the indigestion spilling over to him from Beel. 

With a glance between them, over her head, they worked together and shuffled everyone up toward the headboard. “Alright, let’s get a look at you,” Belphegor said once he had her settled in against Beel. 

He looked down at the tacky, blood smear she’d left on his sweater. “You know, when I said I liked you messy, I didn’t mean like this.” 

It was a good thing she was tired or she likely would’ve walloped him with a pillow. “You’re a pain in the ass,” she said fidgeting with a button atop the knot she’d made of her dress. 

“Not unless that’s what you’re into,” he said and ignored her annoyed huff in favour of continuing his evaluation of her. It probably wasn’t the first time she’d girded herself with a long robe if the tightness of the knot around her hips was anything to go by. ‘Always ready to run or fight,’ he thought. He clicked his tongue disdainfully. “Alright, show off the all encompassing, transcendent oath Lucifer decided to bestow. Knowing him I bet it’s flashy.”

Hesitantly, she uncurled her arm from her belly and held it out to him. Turning the palm up, the blood on it cracked and flaked when she spread her fingers.

“Not too deep,” Belphegor said and poked at the meat of her thumb, directly next to the cut. The short wound gaped.

“Ah! Hey!” she said, jerking her hand back. “Bad demon!”

He rolled his eyes while Beel cuddled her closer with low notes of succour rumbling out of him to fill the room.

“I’ve got to see what I’m working with,” Belphegor said. His reminder went unanswered, but he wasn’t perturbed: the corners of her mouth were no longer in a permanent downward point and she didn’t try to keep her hand when he moved to retrieve it. “Your job,” he said, looking up from his inspection of her hand, now held in both of his, “is to keep me from falling asleep while I figure out if there’s a weakness or loophole for this to be undone.”

“That’s kind of a lost cause,” she said, poking him in the forehead with her free hand.

He took his left hand away from her palm and held it aloft, reading to swat her thigh and drag her closer to his side with it. “Beel, work on her ankle so I can see if this reacts to other magic?” He brought his hand back down, realizing she likely couldn’t see it in the dark. It was a miracle she hadn’t jabbed him in the eye. “Why don’t you start by telling me what you said to set Lucifer off?” Mammon had refused to repeat it which only made him want to know more.

“Get ready,” Beel said happily, finally able to channel his anxiety into something useful.

“I—Um.” She cleared her throat. “I may have started off by telling him he's a weak and shrivelled little angel hiding behind his pride…”

“Oof,” Belphegor said. He tried to focus on watching the lines of magic that were weaved into her hand instead of giving in to the bitter laughter and hint of horror that kept pressing themselves to the tops of his lungs. “My Princess doesn’t pull any punches.”

She rolled her eyes and tilted her head to the side. “We only got worse from there.”

“Hmm,” Beel said. “That sounds terrible. You should’ve called us.”

“Don’t be silly,” she said, leaning her head back further to try and face him. “You’re _Lucifer’s_ bodyguard. Why would I call reinforcements for him?” She stuck her tongue out, playful even in her fatigue. 

Belphegor saw the truth that she attempted to hide with cheek. She believed it. It didn’t surprise him, but it hurt as well. 

“But I’m _your_ demon,” Beel said, laying slow, wet kisses against her jaw until she smiled and shied away into her own shoulder.

“You’ve got lots of little bits here that don’t belong to this magic,” Belphegor said, squinting as he turned her hand this way and that, “but what you do have is a very thorough covenant. Did you make any concessions on your side?”

She shook her head, her relaxed demeanor gone and replaced with wide-eyed seriousness. Beel wasn’t pleased with the change and removed one of his hands from around her middle to rest along the length of her thigh, further anchoring her in place.

“Do you remember Lucifer’s exact words?” Belphegor asked. Anything could be argued out of if the wording was weak enough.

“No,” she whispered hoarsely. “There were things watching through the windows that distracted me. The jist of it though was that if he hurt me, even by accident or ' _folly,'"_ she said, and made air quotes aggressively with her free hand, "it would hurt him three times as much.”

“What kind of things?” Beel asked, and Belphegor could feel him already climbing a ladder of distress, rung by rung.

“One was red and one was blue. I think Lucifer called them to watch.”

“Witnesses,” Beel said flatly. 

“Well then.” Belphegor set her hand down. “You had no part in the making of this other than agreeing...and he swore it in blood. I’m guessing both of yours?”

She nodded.

“Like father like son.” He sighed. “This is more Satan’s domain than mine, but I think you’re stuck.”

“I should've stabbed him more,” she said, muttering it as if she’d forgotten they were there.

“You stabbed him?” Beel asked, drawing his frame up and back against the headboard to look at her skeptically. He was lucky she couldn’t see his expression. It was unlikely she would have taken kindly to disbelief, awe, _or_ horror.

“He's going to be twice as much of an ass now that he has a personal reason to keep me safe,” she said. She scowled at her hand. “There’s got to be some way to get rid of it short of lopping off my hand.”

Beel was wrapped back around her again as if he’d never left. “Do you want to get rid of it?” he asked.

“I…” She inhaled deeply, her shoulders rising with it until they dropped with a forceful expulsion of air. “I don’t know.” Pressing her lips together and frowning she thought it over. “Other than him having a reason to hover, I guess there isn’t much of a downside, but its not like I had a chance to read the fine print either.”

“His contracts can be quite the blitzkrieg if you aren’t prepared for them,” Belphegor said. “What’d you stab him with?” As angry as he was with Lucifer, it perturbed him that something had actually managed to pierce their commander, and it left him more than a little curious.

The hearty chuckle that filled the room was a surprise, but not an unwelcome one. Beel clutched the human to himself as he keeled over, dragging her down with him so he could use her to muffle his laughter. “His horn!” Beel managed to bleat out.

“You’re compensating me for my lost sleep time,” Belphegor said, unamused at being left out of the joke. At least their human wasn’t laughing too. She seemed more embarrassed than anything. Always a pretty look on her.

“You don’t understand,” Beel said as he caught his breath. “Half of one of Lucifer’s horns was broken off.” Silent laughter continued to wrack his body and their human turned a darker shade of red.

“I...I snapped it off and then stabbed him with it,” she said, as if confessing to stealing one of Beel’s chocolates.

Belphegor could feel Beel’s amusement bouncing happily through their bond, only a hint of guilt tickling at the bottom of it. “Let me guess, he used it to swear the oath?”

Mussing up her already wet and bedraggled hair further against Beel’s chest, she nodded.

“Of course he did.” Belphegor sighed. “Let’s get you dry,” he said, choosing to attend to the only thing he could control at the moment.

This time, Beel let her up and Belphegor began unbuttoning the top of her dress without further discussion. He tried to be disengaged about it, but by the time he'd made it to the third button she was kissing him. So, it fell to Beel to disrobe her, working out the knot in the skirt, while Belphegor lost himself in her mouth.

All of the frenetic energy from before was gone, along with the panic, and now he could take his time claiming her attention slowly and thoroughly. He loved how she felt warm under his hands despite the chill of the wet clothing being peeled off of her.

Beel was kissing each mark he found and it was a heady feeling across their bond, a soft buzz of something Belphegor could never find his way to anymore, a haziness of lust and service.

“Come lay down,” Belphegor said. “You don’t need clothes for a nap.”

“Hmm Just a nap?” she asked, stretching her legs and pointing her toes while he pulled her down with him.

‘So ready,’ he thought. He savoured the way she stared into the dark with bare arousal, and he gave a small laugh, touching his cheek self-consciously to move his hair out of his eyes. “Just a nap,” he confirmed. “We’ll let Beel wrap your hand up while you and I sleep.”

With tiredness already beginning to cloud her eyes, he wasn’t surprised when she nodded docilely. He tossed away his own clothing and pulled her close, promising himself he could behave. Was his blush obvious in the dark? She made a mess of him despite his best attempts to hide it.

Beel said nothing of the giddiness that he must’ve felt from his twin, but fetched a medical kit instead, wending his way quickly through paths made to confuse. 

Belphegor gloried in the laziness of her warm body against his. “I want to sleep,” he said, already nodding off, “but...come see me in my dreams or I'll get mad.” He felt her breath against his chest. Laughter. Did she know he meant it?

The bed moved twice more, and Belphegor knew Beel was joining them. They wouldn’t need blankets with the way Beel’s magic was trapping the heat of the room. It was going to take forever to dismantle later.

“Sleep now, Belit,” Beel said, settling behind her in only his shorts. “Nothing can harm you here.”

Smiling at the use of the old honourific, Belphegor allowed himself to drop off into sleep. If he was lucky, she’d drag him into the meadow in her dreams again.


	108. 345

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Levi, Asmo, and Satan try to make sense of their morning.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to my beta readers ElvishDork and Sarchopathic

**48th Day, Friday**

**11h00**

**345 Chat (3):**

**NotTodaySatan:** I can’t believe Lucifer has the audacity to tell _me_ to calm down!

 **NotTodaySatan:** He almost killed her not once, but twice!

 **NotTodaySatan:** And somehow _I’m_ the one with the anger management issues!

**L3V1:** I’m just glad she’s okay.

**NotTodaySatan:** Don’t say it like I’m not relieved as well.

**NotTodaySatan:**

**L3V1:** You’re sure she’s okay? Maybe we should go check.

**AsmoBaby:** I already said she was. I watched Beel take her away. 

**AsmoBaby:** She looked more annoyed than anything.

**NotTodaySatan:** As she should be! 

**NotTodaySatan:** I’ve had some cursed letters I’ve been just waiting to use.

 **NotTodaySatan:** If this isn’t a sign to test them all out, then I don’t know what is.

**L3V1:** Like a petition of complaint?

**NotTodaySatan:** Exactly!

 **NotTodaySatan:** Lucifer can embarrass himself with his own human.

 **NotTodaySatan:** He has no right to be touching ours!

**AsmoBaby:** Ooh~ Satan, you know I love it when you get all fired up!

**L3V1:** Why aren’t either of you concerned that Mammon called Beel?

**AsmoBaby:** It worked out for the best, didn’t it?

**L3V1:** Did it? It’s not like Mammon to give up when it has to do with her.

**NotTodaySatan:** Well, Asmo did say she stabbed Lucifer. 

**NotTodaySatan:** That does sound like the best.

**L3V1:** You’re missing my point.

**AsmoBaby:** I have the weapon right here!

 **AsmoBaby:** What should I make from it?

**NotTodaySatan:** We all know you’re just going to make a hairclip dagger.

 **NotTodaySatan:** Why do you bother asking?

 **NotTodaySatan:** I’m still trying to figure out how she ended up in my room!

**L3V1:** You said she was covered in algae? 

**NotTodaySatan:**

**L3V1:** If you can’t identify it, send it over to me.

**NotTodaySatan:**

**AsmoBaby:** More importantly than scummy water, how’s IDing those songs going?

**L3V1:** NOT HERE!!!

**NotTodaySatan:** Honestly, I think we should’ve let Belphie go too. 

**NotTodaySatan:** At least he would’ve set Lucifer’s apartments on fire.

**L3V1:** WITH HER IN THERE!

**AsmoBaby:** Oh, he would’ve been fine.

 **AsmoBaby:** Besides, Beel was there. 

**AsmoBaby:** He’s always level headed when food isn’t involved.

**NotTodaySatan:** Do you want to tell him about your tub, Levi, or should I?

 **L3V1:** What don’t you two understand about _not here_?

**AsmoBaby:** Belphie should really try to enjoy life as a demon more.

 **AsmoBaby:** A little fire now and then might do him some good.

**NotTodaySatan:** I take it back, we **all** should’ve gone. _Especially_ if Mammon didn’t.

 **NotTodaySatan:** Do you think he hit his head?

 **NotTodaySatan:** I can’t imagine any other reason why he wouldn’t have escaped with her.

**AsmoBaby:** Maybe she ordered him not to?

**NotTodaySatan:** After the talk I had with her? Even then, why not call Diavolo?

**L3V1:** I’d bet my entire collection Beel had that talk with her too.

**AsmoBaby:**

**AsmoBaby:** No, but really, songs now?

**L3V1:** I SAID NOT HERE!

* * *

**11h30**

**RHC Chat (3):**

**L3V1:** You have a one track mind, Asmo.

**L3V1:**

**L3V1:** How many times do I have to remind you that she can read a bunch of our chats?

 **L3V1:** I don’t remember which ones were which, but _this_ one is safe.

**stn:** Why weren’t we talking in here to begin with then?

 **stn:** Levi, why has my name changed?

**L3V1:** Because you’re stan-ing as hard as we are.

 **L3V1:** Now moving on. First order of business:

 **L3V1:** This is going to take me daaaaaays. I’m going to have to record so many episodes to get through all this music!

**stn:** I don’t know what that means. Why are the vowels missing?

**AsmoBaby:** Anything revealing yet?

**stn:**

**L3V1:** There are so many levels of underlay. 

**L3V1:** You didn’t tell me Publedina could hold that much data!

**AsmoBaby:** You’re welcome?

**L3V1:** GAAAAH!

**stn:** So, nothing of interest then.

**L3V1:** I didn’t say that!

 **L3V1:** I’ve recognized a couple of melodies she probably shouldn’t know.

**stn:** She doesn’t spend enough time with Simeon and Luke to have learned Celestial either, but here we are.

**AsmoBaby:** Should we tell the twins about the music?

**L3V1:** No!

 **stn:** No!

**L3V1:** They’re already ahead of the game.

**stn:** Telling Mammon could create some good will though.

**AsmoBaby:** Too sloooooow. I say we do this the old fashioned way.

 **AsmoBaby:** Get some Golden Hellfire Newt elixir and...

 **AsmoBaby:** lock us all in one of Levi’s hentai games!

**L3V1:** No!

 **stn:** No!

  
 **L3V1:** It’s not hentai!


	109. Bad Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While MC is recovering from her fight with Lucifer, and subsequent stand off with Beelzebub, Belphegor realizes that she gets nightmares and tries his best to help.
> 
> Minor Gore warning ahead.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday early afternoon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading.

Beel was heavily asleep, Belphegor could tell. So, what was it that had dragged him half-up from his own unconsciousness?   
  
The static he heard was annoying: there was no enjoyment in hearing the faded echoes of someone else’s nightmares if he couldn’t partake in the karmic schadenfreude himself. He dredged himself out of the sucking muck of sleep to find the static that sounded too close for comfort. Cracking an eye open, he took in the human twitching and huddled between himself and Beel. ‘Fuck,’ he thought. The beloved of the Avatar of Sloth was suffering nightmares while still in his arms. The irony was painful.

He grimaced before reaching out to feel at the edge of her mind. The surface was surprisingly turbulent given how little she moved or spoke. If only he could see in. It was too dark. Was she afraid of the dark the way Mammon was? Or maybe just afraid of the things in the dark. 

Carefully, he tried to calm her by attempting to smooth away the ripples across the surface of her mind the way Leviathan would waves. It was always so much harder to pacify from the outside. 

If it were Beel’s dream, he’d step inside without a second thought. He’d face the same nightmare they'd shared since Lilith fell, and coax Beel through it by focusing him on some strange minutiae, until his own mind would wander and chase after the unusual green cloud under his feet.

Taking a deep breath, Belphegor relaxed himself and pushed past the boiling pressure of her conscious mind to slide into the darkness under it.

He wished he’d tried again to calm her from outside or been lazy enough to shake her awake. His stomach dropped, wet and cold, into the arches of his feet and he tried not to heave it back up at the sight before him.

This was why she wasn’t moving in her sleep. 

She couldn’t. 

She had no limbs left, only tourniqueted stumps. 

The stench of roasting flesh was heavy in the room and a rush of screaming and blood poured into Belphegor’s mind, the way only dreams could fill in history. He caught glimpses of himself slicing off her hand only to cut it down more finely, feeding each finger and each carpel dotingly to Beel as if they were baby carrots.

At the onslaught of imagery and sensation, he lost the battle against his clenching stomach and retched.

Closing his eyes against the sight, he willed away the smells and sounds closest to him. If the spitting and popping of roasting fat would stop flecking against his face then he’d be able to control his stomach. Was this how she saw them?

He shook away that thought. Dreams were a culmination of many things which could mean everything or be snippets of junk to be processed and deleted. Without watching her mind for longer, he wouldn’t be able to unravel or interpret this. 

When he felt in control of himself, he opened his eyes and moved to her side on the non-descript bed, sweeping past the shadows of his own form and Beel’s, making them swirl and dissipate like mist. 

This had to be fixed. The longer he was here, the more he noticed perfected details. ‘ _ Drip. _ ’ Hallucinogenic levels of realism were a sign of strong emotion. ‘ _ Drip. _ ’ Or persistency. ‘ _ Drip.’ _

It took more effort than he’d expected to erase the sound of her blood dropping slowly off her stumps to the floor below. There was still a possibility that he and Beel had been superimposed over this nightmare. Changes in the nature of their relationships could be enough to bubble them to the surface and enmesh them here.

The hiccoughing sob that came from her broke his heart.

A breeze whispered softly around him. It caressed and warmed his skin lovingly, until it sent cold ice down his spine: he heard Beel’s voice as if he were at his ear instead of hers.  _ “You won’t taste as good if you don’t struggle.”  _

There was no malice in it. It sounded worshipful and that only made it worse. ‘Did he kiss her tears away while he ate parts of her raw too?’ The flashing image of white teeth meeting the white, yellow, and red of her scapula made him cringe. They hadn’t been all clean cuts.

_ This _ was why she still tensed when any of them showed the slightest hint of displeasure. Whether the perpetrators were specific or not, how many dreams like this did she have? How many versions were there?

Still at her side, Belphegor heard her vocal cords squeeze and squeak around her pain; with no tongue to give voice to it she gurgled.

“This isn’t real,” he told her softly and she held her breath. His voice wouldn’t be what helped her here, but there was nothing in this room he could get her to focus on that wouldn’t make it worse: it reeked of death. In this self imposed cage, the only sounds were of her pain and the sizzle of meat on the hot plate nearby. What remained of her amputated tongue was likely coated in blood. With so many senses overwhelmed, it left little for him to work with to distract her effectively.

He was afraid to touch her. Was it better that her eyes had already been plucked out so that she couldn’t see her saviour, a doppelganger of her torturer? 

Wetting his lips, he kept his hands fisted in his lap and called out loudly instead. “Baku-san, Baku-san, hear my call.” He paused, waiting. This  _ was  _ something he could do on his own, but the more he touched dreams with images of himself in them, while he was inside them, the messier it could become. There was the chance that layers he was unaware of would cling and stick to other parts of her mind, poisoning her in ways he wouldn’t guess at until it was too late to fully reverse. It would poison her further than she already was anyway and that was something he couldn’t inflict on her. It was clear that his kind had already inflicted enough damage. “Baku-san, come eat this tasty dream.” 

A door appeared out of a wall of darkness, and the chimera stepped out of a closet that he hadn’t noticed before. The heavy bear body lumbered on the silent paws of a tiger, ox tail swishing behind it. They looked at one another and the Baku raised its trunk to him in deference while it leaned its forebody low.

“Devour every last bit of this dream,” Belphegor said with an impatient authority. He wanted to comb his fingers through her hair but she’s gone stiff at the sound of his voice near her. 

Sleepy rhinoceros-like eyes crinkled the excess skin around them in a slow, affirmative blink. His command would be met without complaint, likely with gusto given how quickly it had blinked.

As long as he was here, the creature wouldn’t get out of control. Oftentimes, it had a hunger too much like Beel’s and he couldn’t risk it devouring her hopes and dreams along with her terror. Maybe he’d find her a baby Baku that they could train together.

Belphegor watched its tusks grow out and then gore the fabric of her nightmare. Reality wobbled around them like a tent rent open, until finally a heavy steam began to fill the room, puffing out of the creature’s long trunk to soften and peel away the edges of the dream like wet wallpaper. It snuffled and slurped up the meal, rolling in it for a moment before consuming the last of it.

Looking around at the emptiness before him, Belphegor rose to his feet and strode to meet his subordinate. It wouldn’t do to let it come closer while she was still unstable. He reached his hand up to pat the chimera’s head. “Good work. You’re dismissed.” 

Soft, green clover flourished under its feet as it stepped back and disappeared into the nothingness it had revealed. He frowned at the plant matter and looked back to his mistress, who was whole again and wearing the same damp dress that he’d discarded before they’d slept. ‘So, she can still control things here, at least somewhat,’ he thought. How had it gotten away from her so badly? Was her fear of being eaten that deep-seated? Something to check on nightly from now on, he decided. 

The faint light that illuminated them both in the void darkened with his thoughts. He’d be having a word with Mammon as well. Sleeping next to her so often, he’d be able to smell the sour sweat of it on her skin. There was no way he didn’t know of nightmares this thick with violence and fear.

“Get out,” she said. The words were loud and short like a startled bark. She grabbed at her throat, clearly having forgotten she had a tongue again and no blood to croak the sound past.

Belphegor stepped toward her and her hands shot up to shield herself from him, from an attack that would never come. She’d conjured heavy chains to ensnare him and that anchored into the empty world around them. For anyone else, it would be perpetual imprisonment. 

When she flexed it, her control was impressive for a human. Pride for her niggled somewhere deep in his chest. Even skilled sleep demons would have trouble with her.

He blew a puff of air out of his nose, disturbing the cobweb like muzzle that was taking shape. With one shrug, the chains fell uselessly at his feet. “Do you remember your dream?”

Her eyes widened with fear and then moved slowly from side to side, searching the nothingness around them for clues. “No,” she said slowly, “but it felt...bad.” She rubbed her hands over her upper arms, trying to warm herself despite the lack of heat or cold in the nothingness and clover. “Leave.”

Instead, he stepped closer and ignored her flinch when he sat next to her. “When I said, ‘ _ Come see me in my dreams or I'll get mad _ ’ I didn’t mean shout loudly until I come save you from yours.”

Without another word, her hands were around his throat and her weight was heavy on his chest. He made no move to stop her. She was barely squeezing. Sunlight burst into existence, bathing them in warmth as she began to cry over him. Truly, she was holding onto him more than choking him.

Then the world was turning, only it didn’t stop as he’d expected it to. Their roll in the grass turned faster and faster, until he was thrown back and forth, and the bite of a belt cut into him with each rotation. Screeching and the dull crumpling of metal reverberated through his skull, only stopping when the rain of glass began to fall in earnest. ‘The fuck is this now?’

Red, no  _ blue _ flashing lights lit up the interior of the vehicle. No, that wasn’t right either. Were the lights green or purple? They flickered through the wreckage and, seeing them through her eyes, he couldn’t pinpoint the colour without the added layers of his own vision. Was this how dull her world looked? A light, with the rough approximation of the colour of Leviathan’s eyes, created shadows around them. It brought images of icy, broken highways with it. Now snow and asphalt were inside the vehicle with him. Perfect.

Belphegor frowned and tried to extricate himself from the dream. This one would be easier to shift from the outside; he could get her to concentrate on the falling snow and draw it into a snowball fight, or whatever it was that humans did with snow nowadays. Ice sculptures, maybe?

But he couldn’t budge. The cold seeped into his bones and anchored him to the nightmare. This wasn’t right. It was happening again. She’d taken all control of the reality here, and once again didn’t know what she was doing. Did she even recognize it as a dream still?

Both inside and outside the vehicle simultaneously, he watched as she woke and fumbled with the cracked screen of her phone. She froze when the light of it swept over the only other occupant of the vehicle. “Jaime?” she whispered, leaning toward the young man before tapping her hand on his shoulder. The tapping became more insistent and she continued to call his name. “Jaime, you have to wake up. We’ve gotta get out.”

She seemed younger. Her hair was different and her mouth the tension around it that he associated with suspicion. The lights were getting closer, and with them came voices, indistinguishable from one another over the loudness of her breathing.

This had gone on long enough. Belphegor reached toward her to make her aware of his presence. His reaching seemed to go on forever, always drawing closer but never quite enough to touch her. 

It had been an age since he’d manually manipulated a dream from within it; he might not be able to get out without her being conscious of him first, but even if he couldn’t steal her attention right away, he could interact and change the narrative of any dream.

Giving a loud huff, he gave up on alerting her and instead focused on waking.

Nothing happened. 

The harder he tried to press himself towards his own body the slower things moved around them until he was watching the blood drain from her face frame by frame. 

He sighed and tried to suppress his growing panic. It was a rare foe that could catch him unawares, but it was terrifying to think she wasn’t doing it on purpose. It meant she didn’t have a plan for how to release him either.

It seemed the only way out would be to let the dream play out until her REM cycle waned. He stopped dragging the images around him to slowness and instead watched uncomfortably as her younger self shrunk from the body next to her, then thrash as she tried to get the seat belt to unjam. 

Unholy screams for help, and the answering sounds of crunching footsteps and shovels, washed over him. The whir of a motor sounded nearby and the dash in front of her lurched forward; the bite of the safetybelt across her hips filled his perception.

Heavy scissors sniped the seatbelt out of indented skin. 

And then he was the one being dragged out of the door.

‘Had we always been sideways on the hill?’ 

The roof had been removed by scissors with bigger jaws, like a tin lid snipped and then rolled back. 

Still, the body he was in kicked and flailed, even though the lower half of one of her legs was barely still attached. ‘Had she had a scar like that when he’d met her?’ he wondered, trying to remember. There were certainly no scars now. Asmodeus always told her how even her skin was.

The deluge of emotion struck him, and the rawness of their shared throat felt like nothing, as she begged for her shadow rescuers to leave her and save her  _ brother _ . 

It made sense now. This wasn’t a nightmare. He couldn’t alter the major points because it was a memory.

“Please...Please, he’s hurt and I’m not. Let go!”

The leafless trees outside of the vehicle stretched their black branches in every direction, like diseased neurons: human suffering across the winter sky. There was nothing but the howling of the wind, sirens, and the lifeless body she refused to believe existed.

It was a memory. A memory he shouldn’t have seen. This wasn’t right. He needed to get out. Accidentally altering something here, even in a small way, would be unforgivable. He was lucky he hadn’t already. All he’d done was prolong her misery by stalling its completion.

A wave of grief struck Belphegor and sucked him back down again, knocking the air from his lungs so that he lay flat on his back in the snow. So familiar. So bittersweet. He knew this feeling too well. It was his closest companion other than Beel. Was this why she tried so hard to forgive him?

He wallowed in it with her for a time. Only when the blood loss was great enough did the shock halt the terror and rage from ravaging them both. After this, those emotions would have woken with her, likely in a hospital bed based on the faint but even beeping he heard. 

The world around him disappeared into nothing as she slipped into the sleep within sleep: cold and helpless, dread heavy in her limbs. 

When she sunk into the depths he didn’t follow; it wasn’t a place company  _ could _ follow. So he rose, kicking his way to the surface as her grasp on him loosened. When he woke he was too stunned to move. Would she remember? Would she know he’d seen?

His stillness was useless: she was already scaling the foot of the bed and the trunks, struggling to keep her feet under her. “Beel!” Belphegor called out, shoving his twin awake as he leapt out of their nest to catch her bare form.

Sleep-torpored limbs slowed Belphegor, but he still caught up to her before she hurt herself. “Stop,” he said softly, wrapping his arms around her from behind. “Stop, you’re safe.” He could feel the claminess of her skin against the length of his own naked body.

She sobbed hysterically when she wasn’t gasping for air, and he wasn’t sure if they should move her. The short peaceful naps he’d had with her hadn’t prepared him for this. It was only recently that he’d begun to creep into her bed, waiting for her to kick him out. Why hadn’t Mammon ever told him about her bad dreams? 

“Let go! Let go. Let go,” she chanted when her breath would allow it. Her eyes were wide open but unseeing. “I have—I have to go back.”

“Still asleep,” Belphegor said as Beel came to stand before them. He grunted the words out as she caught him in the side with an elbow. “Night terror.” Putting her into a deeper sleep wouldn’t help. It would only imprison her there until she was ready to fully wake. Even if she wouldn’t remember later, it wouldn’t be pleasant.

Her knees rose up and down futilely only to be caught by Beel, who knelt down and wrapped himself around her.

Belphegor heard and felt the drowsy growl that passed from Beel through their human. It was warm and soothing. Could she feel the safety and coziness he projected? The thickness of imaginary socks were warm on his feet and he could practically taste the hot drinks around the common room fire. ‘Smart.’ 

The frequency of her flailing arms lessened, only occasionally making one of them flinch. Belphegor joined in, chorusing Beel's thoughts while he tried to convey all of the sweet laziness of his own that he wanted to enjoy with her.

When she started to go limp, he nuzzled her cheek with his own. “Move off,” Belphegor whispered. 

There was a hesitation from Beel but it didn’t last and Belphegor was able to pick her up to return her to the bed. He didn’t miss the frustration he felt festering on Beel’s side of the bond.

Shifting pillows and blankets, Belphegor rearranged her amongst them, ensuring their nest would support her properly while she slept off her struggles. He sidled up in front of her and ignored Beel, instead thinking back on the memory she’d nearly drowned him in. 

Dreamscapes supplied too much information compared to what was shown, and he knew the other driver was dead. Had she wanted vengeance too? Would she have mutilated their corpse if the blood loss hadn’t kept her from it? He’d have dug up their grave just to desecrate their empty shell properly.

With her between them again, he tried to relax. She seemed peaceful, her breast rising and falling evenly. Then he noticed it. How had he not seen it before? He frowned in the darkness. Had he really been that distracted by her wandering hands while Beel had been undressing her? It was a crow pendant.

Gingerly, he slipped a finger under the chain. The chain was new, but the pendant was old. Very old. He considered taking it off of her to look at it more carefully later, but imagined her reaction: she’d think he was being jealous of Mammon. As if he would ever be jealous of Mammon. Mammon who wouldn’t trust a Dream-Lord with his human’s mind even if it meant quelling her suffering. 

With slow care, he set it down to rest against her sternum. He had more than enough harsh words for all of his older brothers but it would have to wait; he needed to be here, listening, in case another nightmare came for her. 

He wasn't sure if Beel had fallen back asleep yet but he was too angry to reach out across their bond; the temptation to rattle his twin’s cage of consciousness, if he did go to check, was too great. “I’m still fucking livid with you,” Belphegor whispered into the dark instead.

A grunt came from Beel, and childish irritation surged along their connection. He’d heard just fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You've all been so quiet these last few weeks, so please let me know if you're still reading <3


	110. Just Tired

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC wakes up from her nap and lunch is considered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their diligence and multiple read throughs!

She blinked tiredly, trying to bring the darkness of the room into focus and then reconsidered, closing her eyes again; maybe she’d just stay here forever and let the warmth seep into her bones. There was no reason to get up. What was the point?

“Are you not sleepy?” Belphegor asked. His breath was warm against her face.

Well, that explained half of the heat around her. “No,” she said, despite her voice sounding weary on her behalf. He was the literal lord of Sloth; why did he bother to ask when he could feel her lethargy?

“Then you should get up,” Belphegor said, while removing his arm from around her.

She moved to sit up but gave out a small yelp when, from behind, she was quickly turned over and pulled away from the layers of pillows. _There_ was the other half of her warmth. “Belphie, that has to be the least sloth-like thing you could say.” Her laughter was muffled by Beelzebub’s chest. She ‘hmmm’d her contentment over the new position.

“You should rest more,” Beelzebub said. At least she thought he said it. Simultaneously hearing and feeling their words in Infernal and English were beginning to blur them together, especially in the dark with nothing else to focus on.

Not one to be left out, Belphegor cozied up behind her. “What about something to drink?”

“Don’t wanna get up,” she said, doing her best to keep the childish pout from her words. He was the last person she’d expected to try and get her out of bed and a niggling suspicion grew shapelessly at the back of her mind.

“There’s nothing that solves insomnia like a nice warm glass of regret, depression and self-loathing,” he said. 

She heard the smile in his voice, but the message chilled her; could he feel her despondency the way Satan could tell when she was angry? Distracting herself with the firmness of Beelzebub’s pecs suddenly wasn’t enough. Did Belphegor know how much she didn’t want to fight the empty-nothingness feelings right now and instead allow herself to fall down that slippery slope? ‘I shouldn’t feel this way,’ she thought. ‘I won.’ Shouldn’t her fight with Lucifer have been cathartic?

“Belphie feels worried,” Beelzebub said. His arm around her tightened. “What’s wrong?”

Oh, her sweet Beel. When he wasn’t hungry, he might as well be an angel. How did these two manage to express the same worry so differently? “Just tired,” she said. It was true. This was a type of tired, just one that sleep couldn’t cure.

“I’ve heard that line before, when you didn’t tell us about how you were still reacting to Asmo’s power,” Belphegor said. "So, what is it, Princess?" 

She pressed her mouth against the dip in Beelzebub’s collarbone to hide from her previous misdemeanor. The feelings Belphegor’s new pet name for her created were too unruly and she tried to hide them away too. Being called ‘Alarm Clock’ was far less flustering. ‘Princess’ conjured up images of him spoiling her and ruining her in equal measure. "It's nothing," she mumbled. 

"No, I think we both know it's not." He swept his hand softly across her temple and down her neck. 

Each gentle pass of his hand was meant to draw her out of her bolt hole, and she just knew he was waiting for her to look back at him. 

"Are you assuming that, when I ask you a question, it's for my own health?" he asked.

"Well, no..." she said, pulling back and turning to try to meet the sound of his voice from over her shoulder. How did he manage to make her feel guilty so easily? It wasn’t like she was trying to waste his time or effort.

"No, you know it's not." Softly, he stroked her cheek, in direct opposition to the hard surety of his words before whispering, "I think you know the rules.” He pressed a kiss behind her ear. “When I ask you a question, I don’t expect to dig for an answer."

She let her breath out slowly, trying to put her jumble of feelings into words. Soft kisses from Beelzebub distracted her. Exposing her profile, by turning to Belphegor, had left her open to Beelzebub’s feather light kisses over her face. “How am I supposed to—” She laughed as Beelzebub’s kisses became more insistent and playful so that he bounced from one kiss to the next without pattern. “How am I supposed to stand a chance when you two gang up on me?” she asked instead.

“You’re not,” Belphegor said, before slowly, very slowly, rolling her back toward him.

It felt like he was exposing her secrets along with her body. She couldn’t see him in the dark, but that didn’t change the urge to hide away everything that was going to tumble out if he kept moving her.

One of Beelzebub’s hands slid over her side and covered her stomach, his fingers spread wide, unwilling to let her go entirely. He couldn’t know how much that single touch kept her from spilling out and falling apart.

With her now facing him, Belphegor pulled her bandaged hand up to his mouth and kissed it. “Tell us what’s wrong.”

‘Us,’ she thought, ‘not _Me_.’ Maybe an old dog could learn new tricks. “It feels stupid to say out loud.”

“It’s fine,” Belphegor said, his shrug expressed through his tone. “Most of my conversations are with meat-for-brains, so anything you say won’t be as half-baked as what I usually hear.”

“Heeey,” Beelzebub said.

She felt Beelzebub’s hand disappear from her stomach to reach across her, likely to flick Belphegor in the face judging by the way he jerked backward.

“Don’t mind him,” Beelzebub said. “He’s like a poison jellyfish some days...and he’s lucky they don't sit well in my stomach.”

It was impossible not to laugh at them. This was the only way she wanted to see them fighting. She tried to hold back her smile when Belphegor leaned in to kiss her. It was a lost cause but he didn’t seem to mind.

“You don’t have to tell us everything,” he whispered, pressing his forehead to hers while Beelzebub slid lower behind her to kiss between her shoulder blades. “Just don’t lie and pretend it’s not there.”

When she finally managed to haltingly force out a thought that made sense, Beelzebub was pressing his lips to her shoulder. “Sometimes, I feel like a clockwork doll; like _just_ as I’m winding down, just as I might be allowed to rest, someone comes along and winds me up and I go running all over again.” 

Belphegor leaned away from her, and she pulled her shoulders inward to guard against the sudden void, shrinking and making herself small. Was he pulling away to study her?

Having scrunched herself up, it drew her away from Beelzebub’s kisses and he huffed before nuzzling against the meat of her trapezius muscles.

“My limbs are—” She found herself suddenly pressed tightly against Belphegor with his chin atop her crown. “...they’re going to fall off before my gears stop working,” she whispered against Belphegor’s windpipe. The little niche where she’d been fitted was tight and he pressed around her comfortingly, driving a bit of the numbness away with weight and heat. It should have been stifling but instead it kept the tears from burning at the back of her throat. 

“So, you _are_ just tired?” Beelzebub asked hopefully.

Belphegor’s tone was as discouraged as she felt. “No, she’s tired like I get tired.” His hand found her temple once more. “It never matters how much sleep you get if your spirit is tired.”

The path of Belphegor’s hand stroking her head created a soft rush of sound over her ear, like the noise inside of a seashell, and she felt herself slowly unfolding once more. If it was always comforting like this, his past needy requests for head pets until he fell asleep made much more sense.

“Don’t worry,” Beelzebub said, “I promise to help you out, no matter what.”

She smiled at his declaration. How could someone so sweet be a demon? She’d met meaner kindergarteners.

“And that goes the same for Belphie,” Beelzebub continued.

“I think we both know you can’t speak for him, Beel,” she said. Unlike in the shower, this time she believed him, but it didn’t mean he should speak for his other half, especially not with Belphegor right there.

“No, it’s fine,” Beelzebub said, laying another kiss along her spine. “I can tell by the stupid smile he gets when he’s messaging you.”

“Beel!” Belphegor said, followed by a chastising ‘ _whap!_ ’ somewhere behind her.

Ridiculous. Imagining Belphegor swatting Beelzebub with his tail in the dark, over top of her, made her shake with laughter. They were ridiculous. She supposed it was only fair after Belphegor had revealed the Boston cream donut comparison this morning. 

This morning felt so long ago instead of the few hours that had actually passed. This whole week had been a blur. It felt like her first week all over again.

“He’s right on the first part though,” Belphegor said, dropping his hand to cup her cheek, his thumb sliding under her chin to guide her mouth to his once more. “It's now very clear to me that we can’t go a day without you.” He brushed his lips against hers as he spoke. “So, we’ll just have to find a way to cheer you up.”

A jolt of lust fizzled low in her belly but it quickly mellowed into something warm when he kissed her too slowly to let it catch fire. It created a different type of neediness in her instead. If she could’ve used her injured hand properly she would‘ve pulled him even closer. As it were, there was a small buffer of air between them, mocking her, making her crave more. She wanted to be covered by him or absorb him right into her skin to assuage the empty spaces inside her that had been worn away by strain and fear.

“My turn,” Beelzebub said behind her, the rumble of his voice deeper than she remembered only moments ago.

She whined at the loss of what contact she’d had when Belphegor reluctantly released her, and then blushed deeply as Beelzebub reeled her in and rolled her into his embrace. Not long ago she’d been certain that she was in hell, but this was surely heaven. Limbs locked around one another, Beelzebub didn’t allow for any space between them, his hands moving over her, searching for injury and grabbing with want. 

The desperate way he held her close wasn’t matched by the kisses he left at the corners of her mouth. She wanted to cover her mouth against the giggles he instigated, yet her smile grew wider as Beelzebub’s aim got worse, and then more insistent, until her momentary lightheartedness was swallowed entirely by his voracity. 

Anything that could make her toes curl the way they did now deserved her full attention. It was instinctive to match the mounting desperation of his kiss and she pulled him closer even though there was no closer they could be. 

Then her stomach gurgled and Beelzebub drew back so that he could look down at her belly, both hands still on her cheeks. She could feel his stare and bewilderment without actually seeing him.

“Any chance you have a better idea what you want for dinner,” Belphegor asked from behind her, “besides ‘something with vegetables?’”

Still breathing heavily from the sudden exertion, it took her a moment to process the question. It was only when Beelzebub kissed her forehead and released her that the question finally made sense. ”Something with cumin in it?” she asked, pleased to talk about something so mundane.

“Cumin?” Belphegor repeated. He sounded confused.

“𒂵𒈬𒉡”1 Beelzebub said without delay.

She heard Belphegor’s hair shift against the pillow and knew he must be nodding his understanding. 

Her laughter shook her body, and she couldn’t tell if it was because it was funny or if it was simply her last recourse. “Language is such a weird concept in this house,” she said to the darkness of the room.

* * *

It had taken listening to several rounds of debate before the twins decided that she was fine to go to the kitchen: the only way to solve the stalemate of who would go make lunch. Neither of them had been willing to leave her side. She’d had to appease them and wear their oversized clothing instead of her damp dress. It wasn’t a fight she was willing to undertake. In retrospect, it was probably as much to keep her from going back to the wreckage of her bedroom - and from Lucifer's sight - as it was to wrap her up in their colours.

She’d noticed that they’d taken the long route to get to the kitchen as well, walking in through the dining room to avoid the partially destroyed hall. This is what she got for hoping her scented candles would burn her room down. Of course it would be after she’d cleaned it.

There would be time to think about recovering her possessions later, not that any of them were irreplaceable. They’d been replacement essentials given to her six months ago. It was hard to get attached to a new rug or bed when you didn’t know what limbo your own possessions were in. “Everything has been taken care of” was hardly a satisfactory answer to her many requests for information. 

But now, she didn’t want to think about Lucifer’s evasiveness or any of that. She just wanted a sandwich. The normalcy of the kitchen seemed strange despite its comfort: Belphegor was half flopped over the prep table, nearly asleep already, and Beelzebub was already partially inside the fridge pulling out various condiments for sandwiches. 

Ignoring the bedsheet, which had become an impromptu curtain, pinned across one of the walls to hide Mammon’s initial escape route from her bedroom, she stood at the table, and with a frown realized she couldn’t cut the loaf in front of her without the use of both her hands. Even without the need for another hand, if she was being honest, she was glad for their company. The house felt too big, and she would feel too small without them there to distract her.

“Is this edible for humans?” Belphegor asked, holding up what might have been shaved meat and dangling it above the paper packaging. “It’s iridescent.”

She tilted her head to the side and debated sniffing it.

“It’s fine,” Beelzebub said with a happy surety. “Cutting against the grain gives it the rainbow shininess. Means it's more tender.”

A flicker of light in her periphery distracted her from the soap-bubble coloured meat. Glancing to her left and down, she found Publedina ambling across the table toward her. Without pausing to bother with the twins, the wombat-spirit’s sharp claws hooked into her borrowed shirt and carefully scaled until she was perched on her shoulder. Why did it feel like the creature was sizing her up? Had Asmodeus sent her to check on her? She’d seen him at Lucifer’s door when Beelzebub had marched with her down the hall and away from everything.

The mal'akh carried no notecard she realized. Instead it jutted its head forward, booping her cheek.

As the sensation of light and colour hit her mind in waves she swayed, and reached behind herself to find the stool for balance. It felt like a hug. Her knees buckled beneath her. It felt like the zipper of Mammon’s jacket was pressing into her skin while he made one of his non-apology apologies. The scent of Devilish No. 5 perfume stunned her, and then it was gone. And the wombat stared at her.

She stared back, unable to look away despite Belphegor’s shout of concern and Beelzebub’s hands on her upper arms. How could she show her gratitude to the little messenger? It had brought her something precious. The heavy knot in her stomach loosened enough for her to breathe deeply and she sagged with relief. She hadn’t let herself stop to consider how afraid she’d been of Mammon’s anger, the possible betrayal she might’ve seen in his eyes. 

What could a messenger be given? She couldn’t even pet her without feeling like her soul was trying to pop out of her body. Shiny things and snippets of knowledge were what the Little Demons always wanted, but Publedina was a mystery. She seemed happiest when zooming about with messages. So she stared, and stared, until finally her feet felt steady enough. And then she was up and on the move.

“Hey, don’t ignore me,” Belphegor said. He wasn’t blocking her way, but if Beelzebub’s hands hadn't already been on her, he’d have likely plastered himself to her. He was staring daggers at the dun coloured wombat on her shoulder.

“Grab me a saucer?” she asked, rubbing at her temple and walking unsteadily toward the walk-in cooler. It took her a moment to find what she was looking for, longer because Beelzebub continued to shadow her, but when she did, she felt the bite of curiosity fill her. Her bare toes wiggled against the cold stone flooring before she made her way back out. Few of the old stories had proven to be right. What if _this one_ had a sliver of truth to it?

Belphegor was waiting for them with a saucer but he still looked concerned, hovering at the cooler door. His frown only grew deeper when she struggled with the top of the milk bottle. 

“Hey!” she said, but the chastisement was weak and she allowed Beelzebub to take the bottle from her. He steadily poured it into the saucer while she kept herself from snatching it back. 

Pushing aside her ‘I’m not an invalid!’ grumpiness, she decided to let him fuss. She didn’t have the energy, and his need to nurture was at the core of him; she’d learned firsthand how willing he was to let it take him over, even to the point of forgetting hunger. Instead she focused on walking slowly and evenly toward the window sill once he handed her the saucer. She didn’t want to spill.

With both hands, she set the dish up on the sill and then waited, looking back and forth between the mal’akh on her shoulder and the dish. The many coloured lights of Diavolo’s castle were brightly lit beyond the glass.

Slowly, Publedina released her clutch on her shoulder and floated up, leaving behind little holes in the fabric, like an old brooch.

There was no hiding her interest: toes wiggling faster against the warm floor, she raised her eyebrows equal to her suspense before biting at her lower lip, waiting. ‘Success!’ Turning around, hands on hips, she faced her demons with a grin. It was a fleeting feeling but she’d take it. It seemed fairies and the lot liking milk was true.

Just as quickly as she’d turned in triumph, she slumped against the nearest surface. She struggled to concentrate on her vision. Was she against the countertop or the table? ‘Beel’s so blurry,’ she thought, but the worry over it felt hollow as if her feelings didn’t quite land where they should in order for her to take action.

This time Belphegor caught her. Over his shoulder, she watched Publedina waddle away, taking her thoughts with her, while the kitchen continued moving of its own accord.

“First time?” Beelzebub asked softly.

“I thought humans can’t do that,” Belphegor said.

“Levi said ‘meatshells aren’t compatible’ but...but I managed it fine earlier.” Her voice sounded drained even to her own ears. 

While Belphegor lifted her up to sit on the table next to a large platter of sandwiches, she shook away the last of the vertigo. Intent on sliding back down to stand on her own, her escape was cut off by Belphegor’s hip. She picked up the platter before Beelzebub could get to it. “I’m just going to take these back with us,” she said.

“Come here,” he said, taking the plate away. “There’s no way I’m letting you go anywhere after you just dropped like a sack of rocks." He picked her up once more, this time setting her on his hip and freeing one arm to carry the sandwich plate.

“ _Belphie_ ,” she said, laughing at the bizarre turn of events, “you don't have the hips to carry anyone like this, much less me.” She half-heartedly reached for the platter.

“Ah-ah,” he said, moving the food out of her reach. “Let me help you.”

Dropping her hand at the same time as a sharp ‘ _thwap_ ’ came from Belphegor’s otherside, she assumed from Beelzebub’s grumble that he’d tried to pilfer a sandwich or three while she was fidgeting undecidedly. 

This felt odd, not bad, just strange. Usually, it was her blow-drying Belphegor’s hair when he was whiny, not him coddling her.

“Consider this your chance to practice being a sloth,” Belphegor said, and adjusted his grip around her.

She expected his hand to get up to mischief with the way he smirked at her, but he took her back to their bedroom with the strange new door and managed to hide more than one sandwich for her from Beelzebub’s returning appetite.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   1. 𒂵𒈬𒉡 is an Akkadian word written in cuniform. Akkadian is an extinct East Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia (Akkad, Assyria, Isin, Larsa and Babylonia). 𒂵𒈬𒉡 is pronounced as kamūnu. [ ▲ ]
> 



	111. Mammon & Lucifer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mammon and Lucifer have an important talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading!

“My human fucked you up pretty good,” Mammon said, leaning against Lucifer’s bedroom door frame. He looked haggard. Other than the blast of sound, Lucifer had left him unscathed in every way, and place, but his heart. The windburn on his face and hands were still far from healed but at least there was flesh over his forehead and cheekbones again.

“Sit down, Mammon,” Lucifer said, not allowing the extent of his own tiredness to show in his voice or demeanor. Their previous punishment sessions together had done far worse than strip external layers of flesh. Those scrapes were barely a drop in the ocean. They didn’t merit discussion.

Striding into the room as if nothing was different, Mammon took up the seat his mistress had vacated, and reclined against the backrest, one foot on the cushion so that he could rest his elbow on his raised knee. His posture seemed confident, yet his jacket hung off his shoulders oddly, as if he’d suddenly become three sizes too small for it and couldn’t fill the shoulders. “What’re ya doin’ Lucifer?” he asked, his voice beyond tired.

After a moment of silence, he slid his foot off the couch heavily and the serving tray next to him jangled. “Mamun-Ra:” Mammon said and hunched forward to rest his elbows on either of his spread knees, “he who hears the prayer, who comes at the cry of the poor and distressed...beware of him.” His fingers laced together to create a place to rest his chin, while his eyebrows lay flat and low above his eyes, as if an unpleasant sleepiness had taken hold of him in his confusion. “Did you think my servant wouldn’t come to me right away?”

“On the contrary,” Lucifer said. “You asked for mercy for her...and I ensured your underling was there to witness it while you were occupied.” He tapped the heel of his free hand against the arm of the chair. “I underestimated her.”

“Ya think?” Mammon shouted and threw his arms wide, seemingly insensitive to the way it made his flesh gape between shoulder and chest. Once pulled tight over his ribs, the new, ashy-pink skin tore and went slack, wrinkling over his side. “We forgave you for lyin’ about Lilith! For lockin’ Belphie away!” His fists now clenched at his sides, the anger and volume dropped away into something colder and more dangerous. “What do you think is gonna to happen if you keep goin’?”

“I received a very similar reprimand from your mistress as well,” Lucifer said, his face pinching in disdain. Admitting to taking the scolding was uncomfortable, even if it had been warranted. It was all the more unsettling to hear it again from Mammon’s mouth. Had she trained him so well, or was this simply the truth of their reality now? Never before had the ugly feeling of being like their father crept under his skin so completely.

“Ya tossed Beel aside to try and tear her limb from limb,” Mammon said, still staring at him hard.

“ _ I  _ did not,” Lucifer said, a hard edge creeping into his words. ‘I wouldn’t have.’ He clenched his hands and relaxed them again, ignoring the sting of the cut on his palm. “The timelines melded but  _ I  _ didn’t do that.”

The silence dragged on between them while Mammon refused to look at him. He stared instead at the broken glass on the floor, pushing his skin back into place and his hand holding it until it mended.

‘Maybe I would have.’ It was a thought that often kept him up at night, but that thought was still easier to bear than the pain of waiting for her to return from Barbatos’ maze of probability had been. “What would you have me do?” Lucifer asked, the words so quiet that the whisper almost didn’t make it to Mammon. “I have protected her from myself, what more can I do? There’s so little of her left to protect...” He frowned, resting his mouth against his gloved fist in thought. “Honestly, I don’t know how many more times I could almost kill her anyway,” Lucifer said. He sighed heavily into his gloved fist, feeling the hot air warm the leather, before running it through his grit-filled hair. “There’s nearly nothing left of her to kill already...”

“Whaddya mean?” Mammon asked, the suspicion in his glare mounting. It was made all the more piercing by the translucent skin that still showed the roundness of his eyes in their sockets. “There’re no dead parts of her. I’m sure of it.” For a brief moment his attention flickered away from their target and his brows created a furrow between them while he thought over something else. “I woulda noticed something like a phylactery or a soul jar to keep her apart.”

“She  _ is _ the soul-jar, Mammon,” Lucifer said, trying to impress the meaning upon him.

“How hard did she hit you?” Mammon asked. His voice was beginning to rise with his frustration again, and he moved to stand. “All human bodies are vessels for their souls! Of course she’s the jar!”

Lucifer closed his eyes as if pained. It wasn’t as though he could scold Mammon for his obliviousness when he himself had missed it, but he’d thought he’d at least catch on once told. “No, not like this!” he said, finally snapping back. His anger, though directed at his own folly, was enough to encourage Mammon directly back into his seat. “Timelines aren’t meant to be merged. It is a drastic measure. We weather it better because our spirits  _ allow _ us to manifest our bodies. Human bodies don’t work that way.”

“Don’t talk ta me like I’m stupid,” Mammon said, but this time there was less bite behind it. “You’re telling me things everyone knows.”

“Today I had a chance to see her,” Lucifer said. He looked over Mammon’s shoulder at the empty spaces within his shelving unit. “Really look at her.”

The incredulity on Mammon’s face was followed hotly by exasperation. “Ya look at her every day!”

“I do try to avoid staring directly into the light of her soul,” Lucifer said dryly. He couldn’t blame Mammon for shouting but there’d already been enough of that today. “Human souls tether to things, and Barbatos mashed together her very essence in an effort to keep her alive before jamming her into one of the bodies. How a reaper hasn’t found her yet with her lights and magic flashing about like a strobe beacon, I don’t know.” There was a tiredness in his bones that Lucifer didn’t want to address. This conversation was draining in too many ways, but it wasn’t over yet. “And that was before all of the potions you lot have been feeding her.” He breathed heavily out of his nose. “She looks like Dr. Frankenstein’s Adam; should I even ask what happened to her left arm?”

Mammon had the decency to look ashamed and Lucifer shook his head to himself. Castigating Mammon would do no good, not in light of his own recent behaviour. “Look at us: willfully disobeying orders and dereliction of duty. We’re quite the pair.” The flush of anger and shame that suffused Mammon’s face didn’t stop Lucifer from continuing. “It amazes me how every time I think I have things in hand she finds a way to flip the entire game on its head.” 

“Enough feelin’ sorry for yourself,” Mammon said. “And I’m not here to be your punchin’ bag right now either, so pull it together.”

“No,” Lucifer said in agreement. “You came to remind me of my place.” He glanced down at his knees, which Mammon had clutched at earlier, but said nothing. “That I’m walking a fine line. It’s true, she’s done an excellent job of splitting your loyalties.”

“ _ She _ ,” Mammon spat the words out, “hasn’t done anything.”

Lucifer frowned and sighed again. It chafed at him the way Mammon was laying out his bad form. Very rarely did he confront him head on about anything, but they both knew this was important.  _ She  _ had become important. ‘Good grief.’ How badly he had played his hand.

Pulling on his other glove stiffly, Lucifer repositioned himself in his seat. His palm would heal soon enough, faster than his horn at any rate. “What do you need from me?” he asked calmly.

“I need ya ta stop risin’ to her bait, you’re better than that!”

Lucifer nodded along, waiting; he knew better than any of them that venting was sometimes the only way to purge helpless anger. Satan was living proof that holding it in could lead to messy consequences.

“I need ya to stop goading her, pittin’ her against you.” He pointed accusingly. “An’ don’t act like you don’t! I can see you’re gonna deny it.”

At the armrest, Lucifer’s rising fingertips dropped back down and he nodded once more. “Continue.”

“I just...I can’t deal with you, and her growin’ magic, and Belphegor, and whatever’s goin’ on outside.”

“You need your generals to stop splitting the corps,” Lucifer said with understanding. His shoulders relaxed. That was an achievable goal. When he’d bedded her, at least after they’d come to an understanding, she’d been compliant and accommodating. He just needed to replicate that in their everyday interactions.

“Damn right!” Mammon said. His anger didn’t seem fully spent, but the quick agreement had taken some of the wind out of his sails.

It still rankled Lucifer. Changing his methods, especially when she‘d told him more than once that his system of order was too severe; it felt like grit had found a way under his skin. Yet, here he was, already using her advice and taking more of Mammon’s feelings into consideration than he ever would have before. “What’s this about her magic?” Lucifer asked, the concern in his question masked by the slow spread of his wry smile. 

Mammon pointed sullenly to Lucifer’s head then dropped his hand in his overall exasperation. “Your fuckin’ horn’s off,” Mammon said lamely. “Obviously, she’s not ‘sposed to be able ta do that.”

“Indeed,” Lucifer said. All of the strange occurrences slowly began coming into focus. “Or her vanishing act.”

“That wasn’t you?” Mammon asked. His eyes were wide with alarm.

Lucifer raised an eyebrow. Was he serious? The side stairwell and balcony balustrade had collapsed from the force of his anger over her disappearance. 

“Well, she’s doin’ stuff she shouldn’t be able to do,” Mammon said. “I mean, I know she could do things when Solomon lent her power, but when she got here there was barely enough juice in her ta make a lightbulb shine. Now she’s...” He waved his hands ineffectually, trying to describe the chaos that resided within her.

Strumming his fingers on the armrest of the chair was the only further tell Lucifer revealed about his concerns, content to let Mammon untangle his thoughts and suspicions aloud.

“Satan said he’s lookin’ into it but...it’s takin’ too long,” Mammon said. He brought a hand up to rub uncomfortably at the back of his neck. “Said it might be her Celestial heritage or whatever.”

That got Lucifer’s attention. ‘It shouldn’t be a surprise,’ he thought, ‘and yet, we never considered it...no, I never considered it.’ He should have, given how she’d responded to Celestial speech in her sleep. Had this been a part of Lord Diavolo’s plan all along? Surely not. What would be worth this level of chaos? “What shall we do?” Lucifer asked.

Mammon started, his posture suddenly perfect in his uncertainty. 

For once, his thoughts weren’t plainly written on his face, and the change tugged painfully at Lucifer’s heart. ‘How far we’ve fallen away from one another to be at this point.’ This rift, and many others, never would have come to pass if Lilith were still with them. He let the human’s claims tease at his mind. Was Lilith still with her in spirit or was their human’s mind fracturing under the strain of living and dying in Hell? Hallucination and obsession had taken hold of humans under simpler circumstances.

“Uh, well. I guess you already solved the hurtin’ her problem. You got a plan for the gettin’ along part?” Mammon asked.

“I have a few things in mind,” Lucifer said. Pulled from his darker thoughts, he allowed a real smile to reach his eyes.

“Oi. Oi. No gettin’ all lovey dovey with my human,” Mammon said. “She’d see through your crap anyway.”

‘Oh, little brother.’ If only he could share his knowledge of what she was willing to put up with for scraps of his physical affection. Even after the magic had run its course she’d still clung to him. If he’d managed to keep his temper he might’ve been able to keep her afterall. He knew his own sentimentality for her ran deep, but it could be centuries before he’d win back her full confidence, at least to the level of complete trust he wanted from her. Perhaps one day. Knowing the others they were already intent on finding ways to extend her life.

“What shall we do about her magic,” Lucifer asked, intoning that it wasn’t a rhetorical question. “She’s absolutely filled to the brim with potions and bits of our magic, even mine.”

“Yours?” Mammon asked.

His question was more aggressive than Lucifer had expected. “Yes, trace amounts.” He frowned in thought before continuing. “Perhaps that was the surge of pride I felt during the scene at The Fall.”

At the mention of The Fall, a visible tension ran through every line of Mammon’s body. “Whaddya mean?”

“When I helped her up from the floor, at first there was fear, but then the longer we pretended to dance the greater her pride seemed to be, the straighter she stood.” He strummed his fingers in quick succession. “I had assumed that it was simply an emotional response but…”

“But?”

Lucifer’s fingers stopped moving. “It was stiflingly concentrated when she said we needed you and then you appeared.” Had she called him or was it coincidence?

Puffing up at the secondhand praise, Mammon relaxed back into the sofa, lacing his hands behind his head, and pressing his hair forward, like a happy cockatoo. It only served to highlight the sparseness of the fresh hair growth in the front. “Yeah, well, who wouldn’t be proud to have the Great Mammon come for them?”

Lucifer didn’t say anything. Was his magic responsible for her limping off the dance floor? Human’s couldn’t heal themselves, but they would do exceptionally stupid things for pride, surpassing their own bodily limits even. 

“I have my plan,” Lucifer said, “How will  _ you _ keep her safe going forward?” He continued to mull over her reaction at The Fall while he waited for an answer. Mammon’s power he could understand attaching itself to her in some manner, but  _ they _ had nothing. After their fight, she’d even resisted his attempt to make a pact. He flinched from the memory of her refusal of both his power and his advances. Her defiance and scorn had been complete.That would be a wound slow to heal. 

There was no reason for his power to reside in her, not even in trace amounts. ‘How would she even begin to use my power?’ Candles barely flickered for her. Surely, if she’d had access of any sort she’d be able to at least levitate the heavy cookware for herself; he’d personally mocked his Little Demons for complaining about lifting so small a weight for her.

“I...Uh, I have some ideas.” Mammon seemed to shrink in on himself, hands retreating from the back of his head; the victorious points which his elbows had been before were now tight against his sides. “You saw that we can’t keep her locked up, but she’s special ‘n’ soft so we can’t just let her out alone either.” Deep in thought, Mammon’s brow scrunched up as it did when he was calculating compounding interest. He was lost in his own world until words spilled out of his mouth without warning. “She used to like walkin’ home by herself,” he muttered, “but it’s just gettin’ worse out there.”

‘Special,’ Lucifer thought. ‘A very kind word for her entropy.’ Would her innate chaos have been enough to drag in some of his own magic? No, that was too simplistic. He would have felt it and required recompense. ‘Could our regular exchange of barbs and promises have been enough to create a weak compact?’ That had never been the case in his experience, but then again he’d never been in close proximity to one human for so long. 

“Draw up a list of proposals,” Lucifer said. “I’ll review them before supper and see about implementation.” He wanted to finalize their plans quickly: Mammon needed time to concentrate on healing so that he didn’t scare the poor woman half to death at dinner, and once Mammon left, he could barricade himself inside his room and flop unceremoniously onto his bed without anyone to see. It wasn’t even noon yet and today had already been a long day. At least Mammon’s eyelids had fully regenerated now.

“You know what?” Mammon said, perking up from his fugue. “Let's go relax at some fancy bar. Ya, a quiet one that won't hurt your ears. Just you and me.”

Lucifer reached forward to collect the empty mug the human had left behind, filling it with black tea. “Proposal dismissed. I'm well aware you simply want me as far away from her as you can get me.”

Mammon didn’t say anything, and that said volumes.

“There’s something else?” Lucifer asked, honestly curious. Usually, it wouldn’t take this long for it all to come tumbling out, but Lucifer found himself trying to learn patience for the second time in his long life.

“I just—I just don't know anymore,” Mammon said, and Lucifer set down his cup at the solemnity of his words. 

This was the Mammon who’d fallen with him: only as strong as he needed to be, for as long as he was needed to be, and now he was on Lucifer’s couch, eyes red-rimmed and throat too tight to speak without halting. 

“I keep thinkin’...she's gonna break or die again.” Mammon inhaled deeply and ran his fingers through his uneven hair forcefully, looking haunted as he stared through Lucifer. “But I'm startin’ to think there's nothing she can't handle.” This time his eyes met Lucifer’s unwaveringly. They didn’t lack any of the fear from before, but it was restrained now, hopeful and pained. “Even if I’m not the one at her side.”

With a deep sigh, once more Lucifer took up the mantle which he both loathed and cherished. “If today’s argument was anything to judge by, she's been broken this entire time.” He rested his uninjured hand on Mammon’s knee, startling him from his reverie. “I’ve seen her knocked down, defeated, in pain that she could barely cover, or at least unable to hide from me; but every time she keeps getting up, looks terrors in the eye and never runs.” How many times had she proved that with him alone? More times than he could count.

“She runs when she’s ‘sposed to,” Mammon said, crossing his arms defensively and looking away. 

It was hard not to smile at Mammon’s sulky riposte. “Well, if she hides, from what I’ve seen, it's only so that she can plan her next offensive,” Lucifer said. “She's a warrior as much as you are, Mammon, but even she has her limits.” He squeezed Mammon’s knee, forcing him to look at him again. “Don’t run away from her just because you’re hurt or afraid.”

“It’s not because I’m—”

Lucifer released Mammon’s leg and held up his hand to stop him. ”I shall spare you from having to explain. Allow me to make a suggestion instead.”

“It’s not what I want that matters,” Mammon said quickly. “That’s why I gotta get someone like, someone like—someone else ta watch her! I keep failing. I’m not enough to keep her safe anymore.” He swallowed hard. ‘I’m not good enough,’ was what he meant.

Never one to shrink from doing what was best for his family, Lucifer knew today would be no different. Gut churning, he took in his lieutenant’s defeated form. “You know how hard it is, how tiring it is, to always be strong when you're close to the edge, Mammon,” Lucifer said softly. 

He wanted to kick himself for sheltering Mammon’s puppy love. The kernel of jealousy, which he often ignored, ate at him with voracity now. It was a foregone conclusion that she wouldn’t want to look at him for at least several weeks, but that didn’t make pushing Mammon closer to her any easier. Remembering the pain and madness she’d shown him today, his dreams were too far gone now to be realistic, and so he would crush down his own wants as he’d done so many times before. 

“She doesn’t have her own family here to support her the way we do. She’s alone and she needs you now more than ever,” Lucifer said. “I won’t order you to be at her side, but…think on it.” Maybe a visit to her family would be in order. It would be a chance to look in on Lilith’s progeny, something he’d never allowed himself, something he’d thought lost to the cruelty of nature and time.

Mammon fidgeted with his jewelry, twisting his rings with indecision, and Lucifer sat back slowly, taking his tea with him. “I pity those that love as deeply and completely as we do,” he said. “Losing it, or failing to embrace it, is a pain like no other.” He drank down his bitterness with the lukewarm leaf juice. “It kills slowly and softly.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who is interested, I have a short 4 question survey about the story! https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/R22M9V2


	112. Come Home Quickly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belphegor convinces MC to get out of bed to go get her hand inspected by Satan, unfortunately Beelzebub is quite against the idea of her going anywhere.
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to Sarchopathic and ElvishDork for their Beta reading efforts!!
> 
> There is some smut in this chapter. Please skip to the end notes if you wish to gloss over this content.

The space where Beelzebub’s wings had cut into the foam layers of the mattress allowed her body to sag deeper into the bed. “Do I have to go?” she asked. Her whiny question was muffled by her refusal to remove her face from where she’d planted it in one of the extra pillows.

“The sooner we talk to Satan the sooner you can make a decision about your newest blood accessory,” Belphegor said, gently lifting her bandaged hand up by the wrist. He held it there, obviously waiting for her to get up.

Making decisions sounded awful. She didn’t want to move but he was right. The nuances of Lucifer’s pledge to her weren’t going to be laid bare for her by sulking here; the cut would just heal over while she moped and then she’d be left with even fewer options. “Alright,” she said, and forced herself upright with her good arm. Her wrist slipped from Belphegor’s grasp easily, but as soon as she’d made it to her knees Beelzebub grunted his displeasure and his arms swiftly anchored themselves around her naked hips. 

There was no way to see Belphegor’s expression in the dark but she caught herself imagining him frowning. Was she imagining the tiny vibrations of displeasure or was it just the fatigue of her legs creating microquakes through the mattress?

“Beel did you make it to Pulchritude Park before you started chasing me?” Belphegor asked.

There was more grumbling behind her.

“Okay,” she said flatly. “I’m too tired to be choosing for anyone else. We all know I need to go see Satan, and soon. The real question is when am I going, and whether either of you will accompany me.” She crossed her arms, more for comfort than a show of stubbornness. In the dark, she could still pretend her nakedness wasn’t being ogled. “Decide quickly.”

“No,” Beelzebub said, pouting. “Stay here, forever.” He swiftly rearranged them both so that he was sitting at the edge of the bed, his feet planted firmly on the floor, with his mistress on his lap.

The scrap of cloth between them, that he called underwear, didn’t betray any ulterior motive so she allowed herself to snuggle into his neck. With her arms over his shoulders and her legs on the bed behind him she kept herself from sighing contentedly and further encouraging him. If she coddled him just enough he’d likely release her soon; however too much and he wouldn’t let her go. 

She was sure he was just petulant, a rarity for him, and she settled in against him, willing to wait him out. Unfortunately, her legs, out straight behind Beelzebub, immediately fell prey to Belphegor's quick hands. 

“Not the feet!” she shouted. The small cough that left Beelzebub when she squeezed him tightly in her surprise did nothing to deter her squeals and flailing legs. 

With an urgency she couldn’t have mustered moments before, she climbed Beelzebub to escape the tickling. Her toes curled for purchase on his thighs; the hem of his shorts did nothing to improve her footing or keep them both from toppling back onto the bed.

Belphegor laughed quietly in the dark. “Well, now that that’s been decided...”

“What’s been decided now?” she asked. She moved to roll away from the demon flattened beneath her. “Nothing’s been—Ah!” 

Two large, very warm hands palmed her ass, and she was quickly pulled lower by the hips until she straddled Beelzebub’s abdomen. Splayed over him like a frog, sexy she was not.

“Hmm,” Belphegor said. “You might be going somewhere _soon_ , but first you’re going to have to comfort Beel or he’ll never let go.”

A small breath of air blew out her nose in silent laughter while she raised herself up on her good arm. “I’m not a teddy—” 

Beelzebub slid his hands up to her ribs, pulling her back down to his mouth so that he could leave open mouthed kisses over her bare chest.

“B-Beel, Sweetheart, I’ve gotta—”

The suction he applied to her nipple stuttered her thoughts. When he began to flick his tongue and brought his hand up to her other breast she gave up on talking.

“Not feeling too tired are you?” Belphegor asked from somewhere ahead of her.

Having been asleep next to him before, both of them naked, it hadn’t seemed like anything beyond a necessary intimacy for her frazzled nerves. But now, with Beelzebub trying his best to make her squirm, a naked Belphegor in the dark made her stomach flutter with uncertainty and want. 

Belphegor’s hands caressed the sides of her face and guided her back upright, forcing Beelzebub to let her go. “Mmm, a little tired,” she said, not eager to admit it when she could feel Beelzebub’s heavy breathing with each quick press of his ribs against her inner thighs.

“Reach for me,” Belphegor said, and she brought her hands to his chest, gingerly with one hand and firmly with the other. “No,” he whispered, leaning in so that his nose brushed against hers, “with your mind.” 

Beginning to tremble, she sucked in breath, and tried to take strength from the sturdy comfort of Beelzebub’s hands running up and down the outsides of her thighs. Reaching for him magically was a gamble. Sorcerers out of their league were more often than not overcome by their familiars. All it took was a single slip up when too tired to stay in control or too slow to counter the will of a creature stronger than themselves..

Before she could answer him, his mouth was on hers, and his hands were in her hair; but he took it no further than firm close-mouthed kisses. It was still enough to make her dizzy. 

Uncertainty roiled in her belly but so did desire. She wanted to trust them. Couldn’t she? “Kiss me properly,” she whined.

“Reach for me properly,” Belphegor said, teasing the words against the corner of her mouth. “Take my magic into you. I’ll make you properly tired, and you’ll get tongue.”

‘Fucking, filthy demon.’ She knew her thighs had instinctively squeezed together when she heard Beelzebub’s amused chuckle under her. His laughter didn’t stop his hands from sliding slowly up and down her sides, over every hill and valley he could reach.

She shut her eyes, trying to concentrate despite their combined attentions. The entire room was heavy with magic, layers and layers of it, and she was as blind in that world as she was in their lightless bedroom. How long would they keep her in suspense if she couldn’t find him?

“Almost there,” Belphegor whispered, dappling her jawline with kisses. “Find me.”

Beelzebub’s hands gripped the arches of her feet, warming them. His thumbs pressed into the soles, keeping her from curling her toes as he pulled them closer to the backs of her thighs. Like a fulcrum, it tipped her weight more and more onto Belphegor, who took her in his arms eagerly.

It felt like she was chasing an echo of him, trying to find his shadow without light, or the hint of his scent on her pillows a day too late. It was there, hidden under the other magicks around them. There, just there, it felt like he was an inch from her fingertips, even as her physical fingertips brushed the hair from his face.

But she lost her concentration when Beelzebub grabbed her by the thighs and dragged her cunt closer to his mouth. 

“Close enough,” he said and began to taste his way up her inner thighs.

She could feel Belphegor’s want, even without his cock now pressed against her belly. His mouth was on her neck and his need for her drew her in and called out loudly until she could finally wrap her hands around the gossamer thread of magic. It was wispy, like a strand of cobweb compared to the sturdy walls around them, but the moment she touched it lethargy weighed down her limbs with warmth.

“That’s it,” she heard him say as her eyelids became too heavy to open. “Take us into you.”

Awash in his magic, she couldn’t speak and lazily wrapped her arms around him. He was all that held her up when Beelzebub finally found his prize.

“Too tired,” she whispered between gasps, her body jerking of its own volition. When had she leaned back into Belphegor’s hand at the back of her neck?

“But you’re doing so well,” Belphegor said, before finally kissing her the way she needed. He moved languidly, slowly, just as Beelzebub’s hands gripped her hips harder and circled his tongue over her clitoris. 

She couldn’t tell if she was breathing, if she even had a body in the darkness. Nothing hurt. If it weren’t for the pleasure jolting into her with every sweep of Beelzebub’s tongue she would’ve let sleep take her. “Don’t think I can…” She tried to open her eyes again. Maybe they were already open.

“You definitely can,” Belphegor said, nipping her earlobe. “Give in to the feeling. You don’t need control right now. I know you can come just once for me. For us.”

“I-I don’t have the energy,” she said. Her words were barely audible above Beelzebub slurping and moaning beneath her. He sounded too happy in his work for her to ask for her ankles back. He’d returned his hands to her feet and kept her heels a thumbs width from pressing against her posterior, leaving her tense and shaking, dependent on Belphegor for her balance.

“My Princess,” Belphegor purred the pet name against her throat. “That’s what Beel’s for: when you’re too tired, he’ll do all the work.”

She wanted her hands on him, but it was so hard to move; her fingers only flexed now when Beelzebub made her twitch and spasm.

“This is my proposal to you,” Belphegor said. The way his eyes lit up, like little galaxies to match the night around them, they silenced her whimpers that she’d been deaf to before. “I want to fall asleep with you by my side from this day forward, for the rest of my life.”

Beelzebub took her stunned silence as his chance to drag her down and grind her pussy against his mouth fully, finally pressing his tongue into her as he nosed at her clitoris.

“Yes, yes, yes…” She chanted mindlessly. Any moment. She was so close. Her body was going rigid without her permission but she didn’t care. 

The sweet growl that Beelzebub made vibrated through her entire body. His Infernal words crashed through her, feelings made of pictures and sound, and she struggled to name them. ‘Need.’ ‘Protect.’ She was riding her own personal, emotional Sybian. If this was a dream, she never wanted to wake up. 

‘Keep,’ racked through her again and again.

“I want you to be there when I wake up,” Belphegor said. ”I want you to sleep by my side forever.”

It was more than she could take. Her entire body shaking, Belphegor’s words tipped her over the edge, and the world went white.

* * *

She heard Belphegor sigh somewhere far away. It sounded like he was underwater. “Not this time either.”

Waking slowly, she blinked again and again before realizing the space around her was as dark as the back of her eyelids. Someone had been stroking her hair but it was missing now. She stretched carefully, and felt patches of stickiness from her diaphragm to her knees.

When the memory of how they’d flooded her with sensation came back to her, she put her hands over her face. It was so stupid for her to be blushing like this. She’d imagined a lot of things over the past few months, but she’d thought the shower with them would have been near to their best. ‘Fuck, when they work together…’ She didn’t even have a word for it yet. Was this how Asmodeus felt every time he got off? His addiction made more sense if that was the case.

The soft nibble at her shoulder should have startled her, but she’d been reduced to a puddle of limp human. She figured out how to rotate her elbow and brought her hand over to stoke Beelzebub’s cheek, feeling a little proud of the achievement.

“I want to spend the rest of my life eating delicious food with you,” Beelzebub mumbled against her arm. “When I'm with you, everything always tastes better.” 

She rolled to face him and noted that there was more viscosity to the stickiness on her stomach than she’d thought. It could be cleaned up later; right now, Beelzebub sounded very serious, his words just a little too soft. 

The kiss that met her attention was gentle, but she could feel the tension in his hands, how he kept from pulling her closer. “I need you,” he said. There was a hint of hopefulness in his otherwise confident confession. “What do you say?”

Belphegor, from somewhere back where the stairs might be, shouted loudly, “I managed to get into the bathroom, but I didn’t seal it back up. It’s too much of a hassle.” His voice echoed strangely and she had trouble pinpointing it.

“Too bad…” Beelzebub said, his breath warm against her face. “I wanted to hear you say yes.” 

She felt him shift, likely up on his arm judging by how the mattress dipped.

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll have to take it all down anyway,” he said, speaking across her.

Muffled curses echoed back toward them and she wondered what exactly Beelzebub had done to warp the sound to so many places in the room. Nevermind that, what had _she_ sounded like in this strange cavern? The tips of her ears burned hotly. She probably sounded like a strangled goose and despite that, Beelzebub was still being sweet with her.

“I want to spend my days with you and make memories sweeter than all the cake in the world,” he whispered in her ear. 

She loved the way his voice sounded. He spoke so rarely unless Belphegor was around. Then, as his words finally permeated her brain she froze. Was he being serious? Was this more than cuddling and sweet nothings?

“I'll be waiting for you to make your choice.”

The sudden slap of a wet washcloth over her collarbone made her yelp. At least it was warm.

“Glad to see you’re awake,” Belphegor said.

She couldn’t see him, but she could hear the teasing delight he took in making her jump.

“I was getting worried you weren’t going to wake up in time to see me off.”

“Off?” she asked. Her question felt clumsy. 

“To make dinner,” he said, placing pressure on her shoulder to set her flat on her back again.

The washcloth was taken out of her limp grasp and dragged down her torso. It was likely Beelzebub who had it, based on the angle.

“You know, I _can_ manage that myself,” she said, reaching for his phantom hand, wanting to draw back the sweetness from before. It had evapourated so quickly with Belphegor’s arrival.

“Mistresses who pass out don’t get to clean up,” Beelzebub said firmly before his lips began to follow the path of the cloth. 

“We could order in,” she asked more than said. 

Beelzebub’s stomach growled next to her. 

“We coooould,” Belphegor said, “but you still need to get your hand looked at, which means getting up either way.”

The cloth, which was getting smaller by halves, was now sliding between her thighs. Her little wiggle must’ve been enough to garner Beelzebub’s attention because she was nearly upside down before she could fully inhale.

Once more, Belphegor sighed. “Beel, that’s no way to clean her up.” Despite his chastising, he didn’t move to intervene.

The soft rumble she felt at her back, and the way Beelzebub lapped at her over-sensitized clitoris, had her clutching at his muscled thighs. His grumbles reminded her of the discontented purrs Mammon made when she’d try to get out of bed on time and he didn’t want to, but there was something else there: a whiny desperation.

“You can keep her coming,” Belphegor said, “but she’ll just fall asleep and then she won’t be able to eat dinner.”

That slowed Beelzebub, and she wasn’t sure if she wanted to applaud Belphegor or sack him with one of the pillows. The thought disappeared as a soft suction over her clit made itself known. 

Blood was rushing to her head now, but it didn’t matter because Beelzebub was tapping his tongue and she was sure she was suffocating him with how tightly her thighs were tensing around his ears.

“I can’t,” she said sleepily. “Feels nice...but...can’t.”

She heard a low whistle behind her.

“You should know by now that those are the magic words,” Belphegor said, now lower and next to her face, his whisper conspiratorial. “Don’t you remember what happens when you tell him you can’t finish that last rep?”

Belphegor’s words seemed to have been the trigger Beelzebub had needed. 

She almost choked on her own spit when he slid a finger inside of her. Being upside down and unable to wriggle away made it simultaneously more frustrating and hotter. Wasn’t she supposed to be the one in charge? Her body spasmed in his hold when she felt him press firmly inside her, stroking her front wall as if trying to coax her closer to his mouth. 

Trying to squirm away did no good. It was a forgone conclusion now. Beelzebub was going to coach an orgasm out of her whether she thought it was possible or not. His arm, wrapped around one of her thighs at his shoulder, was a band of steel. When he sucked a little harder, her body betrayed her and her leg and stomach muscles went taut. 

She couldn’t tell if she was begging him to stop or keep going; the tap of his tongue alternating with the brush of his finger over that one spot had her crying out loudly and nearly crushing him with her thighs.

It was a very good argument for staying in bed.

Despite slowing his pace, it was still obvious by how he continued laying kisses over her skin that he wanted to continue after this encore, but her limp hands swatted ineffectually at his legs, calling for mercy.

“Want more,” he said against her knee when he allowed her to begin sliding out of his grasp.

Sweet, horrible mercy. She’d been a useless lump before, but she hadn’t known what a boneless pile of jelly she truly could be until now. “I don’t,” she said around heavy breaths, “know how.” She groaned unprettily when Beelzebub set her down entirely. “You expect me to...to deal with my hand when...when I can’t feel my legs.”

The soft ‘hehehe’ next to her had her wondering whether she’d ever actually leave the bed today. 

“We could always send you with a note.”

She could hear the wicked smile in Belphegor's voice.

“But I wouldn’t want to send you into the lion’s den without your wits _or_ Beelzebub about you.”

“It’s a bad plan. I should stay.” Beelzebub said obstinately, but it was less petulant than before. His hand slid to her hip again, searching for comfort with his grip.

“If you don’t go investigate, you won’t be able to be sure it’s safe,” Belphegor said, his tone now more than mildly annoyed, as if he’d already said it a hundred times before.

Just how long had she been asleep?

“Sinkholes happen. They’re not a big deal.”

“Sinkholes don’t happen directly next to Pulchritude Pitch. Your team will expect you there at the very least.”

Beelzebub’s hands now reaching her lower ribs, she put her own hands over them to keep them from roaming further. “If you head out right away, you can make it back in time for supper,” she said while attempting to jostle his arms reassuringly. “I hear we’re having something with ‘kamūnu’ in it.”

The sigh he let out was heartbreaking and her hand moved up toward him of its own volition, aiming for his waist to pull him closer. She’d grossly misjudged where he was and found something far more insistent for her attention than his waist.

His strangled cry electrified her and she wrapped her hand the rest of the way around his weeping cock without hesitation.

“Fuck,” he said, mostly gasping. “I already. I mean, you don’t have to—”

Releasing him momentarily, his groan for her was worth it when she wiggled closer through the nest of bedding and heat. “But I want to.” The blindness that the room afforded to her only added to the hum of sensation that still skated through her. Everything in her demanded more, just a little taste. Body heat swirling softly in the air current, the slide of the linen against her skin, the scent of comfort and sleep with a hint of sex, and the texture of the fine hairs on Beelzebub’s legs under her fingertips: it filled her mind. 

With slow care, she leaned in toward the goal of her current ambition, spreading her hands across his hips still hidden by his sleep shorts. How could he be so fucking beautiful when she couldn’t even see him? She heard his shuddered breath and looked up at him.

It was the two pinpricks of purple and pink light above her that egged her on. Her mind was still too foggy from earlier to do much more than paw at his clothing and it was fortunate that his cock had grown enough to peek out over the waistband, where she could savour him without figuring out how to undress him. With a slow sweep of her tongue, she watched his eyes close and the darkness become complete once more. His groans and the way his hands hovered, trembling occasionally against her skin, made her never want to stop. 

Placing her hand over the rest of his restrained cock she gently grasped his length while sliding her mouth fully around his glans. Her tongue swirling, she felt his muscles tense against her cheek. It wasn’t the most comfortable position, but his growled cursing above her kept her coming back for more. She pumped him a few times over the fabric, and with a swirl of her tongue she pulled off of him with a pop. “Come home quickly,” she said. “I miss you already.”

Beelzebub’s mouth was ravenous against hers, taking everything he could taste beyond her lips, even the air in her lungs. And then he was gone. He disappeared so quickly that she fell back against the bed, barely aware that he’d lifted her to him in the first place.

“Now you’ve done it,” Belphegor said, not bothering to hide his laughter. “You’re going to make him worse than Asmo.”

She snorted her disbelief and rolled over toward Belphegor’s voice. A faint light suffused the room and she was surprised to find him already dressed.

“You’d best get dressed,” he said. “I’d prefer to take you to Satan clothed.” 

If not for the maze of tunnels, big and small, that surrounded them she would have rolled her eyes at him or found some witty quip to goad him back into bed, but the sight illuminated around them took her breath away. The twins had kept it too dark to see when they’d escorted her to and from the kitchen. Now she could see how the round edges of tunnels gave way to honeycomb clustered entrances of varying sizes. Finally, she could pinpoint the source of the air current that had been a constant within the room. 

“How did you get in?” she asked, staring at a set of tunnels that ran vertical before stacking and entwining themselves with tunnels of a lesser gradient. She shuddered, realizing she never would’ve been able to get out on her own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Summary:
> 
> Beelzebub didn't finish his rounds. Belphegor asks if Beel made it to Pulchritude Park before he started chasing down his twin (for his erratic behaviour.)  
> MC doesn't really want to get out of bed to have Satan look at her hand. Beelzebub is pouty and doesn't want her of him to leave. Belphegor tickles to encourage her out of bed. It only results in grabbiness on Beelzebub's part.
> 
> Not one to be left out, Belphegor joins in. There is a mixture of magic and smut wherein Belphegor has MC stretch out her senses to try and find magically him despite already touching him physically. She has a lovely time, Belphegor proposes to her in a roundabout way. She passes out.
> 
> MC wakes up to cuddly Beelzebub who makes a similar proposal, to her orgasm-addled confusion. Clean-up time devolves into needy-Beelzebub reverting to coach-Beel mentality when she says she can't go another round. The last rep is the most important.
> 
> MC sends Beelzebub away on his mission, much to Belphegor's amusement.  
> “Now you’ve done it,” Belphegor said, not bothering to hide his laughter. “You’re going to make him worse than Asmo.”
> 
> She snorted her disbelief and rolled over toward Belphegor’s voice. A faint light suffused the room and she was surprised to find him already dressed.
> 
> “You’d best get dressed,” he said. “I’d prefer to take you to Satan clothed.” 
> 
> If not for the maze of tunnels, big and small, that surrounded them she would have rolled her eyes at him or found some witty quip to goad him back into bed, but the sight illuminated around them took her breath away. The twins had kept it too dark to see when they’d escorted her to and from the kitchen. Now she could see how the round edges of tunnels gave way to honeycomb clustered entrances of varying sizes. Finally, she could pinpoint the source of the air current that had been a constant within the room. 
> 
> “How did you get in?” she asked, staring at a set of tunnels that ran vertical before stacking and entwining themselves with tunnels of a lesser gradient. She shuddered, realizing she never would’ve been able to get out on her own.


	113. Time with Satan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC has crawled out of the cuddle cocoon and tries to make sense of her life while sitting in front of the fire with Satan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for combing through and re-combing through my many many drafts. <3

“I’m surprised to see you out and about,” Satan said. He was slouched to one side in his usual library armchair, one leg crossed over the other to better support his elbow and up-raised book “How did you manage to escape the twins?”

“Oh, I haven’t,” she said. “Belphie’s on the other side of the door making sure I don’t make a break for Terra Firma.” She rolled her eyes before shaking it off with a tired smile. “Don’t worry, he’s just making sure you’re actually here. I think.”

She swallowed thickly, suddenly uncomfortable with how unkempt she looked in her wrinkled and damp dress. If her dress were a person it would be Mammon after three back to back nights out, collapsed on the stairs, attempting to promise her a good time.

“How are you doing after...all of that?” Satan asked. 

Sitting herself on the rug with her bare feet toward the grated fire, she thought quietly about how to answer and let the soles of her feet warm up. Eventually, the last of her afterglow faded away and only the mantle clock and the fire made any noise. 

She pulled out a notecard and pen, sending the false alarm notice to Solomon by Publedina before she’d finished composing her own thoughts. Eventually, he’d forgive her for waiting so long to inform him of her survival, although she suspected Asmodeus had updated him readily enough.

As there was no shuffle of turning pages to be heard, it meant Satan was still waiting for an answer. She tilted her head back to look at him.

“ in Badagry there is a hung-

ry well of water and memory

loss. in Badagry there was a well 

of people lost across a haven 

of water. in Badagry there was

a port overwhelmed in un-return. 

to omit within the mind is to ebb

heavenward. memory is a wealth 

choking the brain in un-respons-

ibility. violence in the mind and 

the mind forgets in order to remember

the self before the violence begot.” 

Satan gave a low whistle and set his book to bridge upon his chest. “Motivated forgetting  _ and  _ memory suppression. What  _ are _ we going to do with the remaining six months of your stay if you don’t remember the first half?”

“Re-learn how to not die probably.” She couldn’t tell if he was frowning, but she had enough frown going for the both of them already if he wasn’t.

“You know I’m always impressed that you can remember so much poetry.” 

She tossed words at him the way one would flick hair from their eyes and ignored his compliment. “ It wouldn’t be a lie if you said poetry was a cover / for my powerlessness, here, on this plane / having ticked off another day waiting for my diagnosis to rise.” 

He continued as if she hadn’t said anything. “Oration and memorization have been a dying skill since the advent of writing outside of the scriptoria and the Imperial Examinations.” 

“You’re ridiculously old, you know that?” She just wanted to stay here, wallowing in discomfort and get it all out of her system now that she could concentrate on it again. His guilt over magicking her into a panic yesterday would be enough to keep her safe while she lay here and tried to think of nothing and everything.

“What’s your favourite poem?”

Just this once, she would humour his redirection, knowing she wasn’t been the best company. Maybe he would sit in companionable silence with her after. “Roses are red, violets are blue, most of my naughty thoughts revolve around you.”

He laughed at her, an open and warm chuckle that had him closing his eyes.

“My apologies, good sir, were you perhaps hoping for something more romantic?”

“Hoping? No,” he said, the smile still reaching his eyes. “Expecting, yes.”

She clicked her tongue at him. “If I muuuust.” Rolling to her side to better see him, she leaned up on her elbow, an ignorant peasant about to tell a riddle to a sphynx. “Nobody knows it's empty,” she said, never taking her eyes off of his, “The smile that I wear.” If he wanted to play doctor, she had no patience left for armor and pride. “The real one is left behind in the past, Because I left you there...”

No longer jovial as before, Satan closed his book slowly. He sat up equally as slowly, the way he did when he was trying not to disturb Rancor from a nap. “That your favourite poem, or at least the ones at the fore of your mind, reference sadness and indolence, however, is cause for my concern.”

“Just another day in hell,” she said without inflection.

“You seem like you could use some rest. It has been an eventful week, even for you.”

She scrunched up her nose at the thought of it. “I could use some more rest and a lot less _ bleeding _ .”

“I wholeheartedly agree. Your veneer is lacking.”

She rolled her eyes at him, the king of false-serenity. “Where has all your snark gone, Satan? You’ve been playing with kid gloves. Should I start accidentally calling you Lucifer to rile you up?”

“You’re about a thousand years too early to survive such a thing,” he said, and though she’d looked away, she could hear how the tightness around his mouth helped each word carry menace, “but you’re right, I’ve been babying you.”

“Stop it.”

“That’s simple enough; when you stop appearing as though you’ll shatter into a thousand pieces, I shall do just that.”

“ _ Well _ ,” she said, acerbic and biting despite the indifferent look on her face, “when you figure out how I can go about doing that, you let me know.” It was too tiring to stay propped up, and she lowered herself belly first onto the red carpet. Staring at the intricate scales on the tail of the dragon table was as good a pastime as any. She traced her finger over one of its hind talons.

“Once I have something worth reporting, I’ll be sure to help you scour away that caustic blight,” he said pensively, rather than with his usual false cheer. His finger tapped against the spine of his book.

If he was judging her, she wasn’t likely to know it right away. She tried not to fidget. Was he actually offering to help her? She did still have to ask him about her hand, the mess of the rest of her life could wait. “You know, out of all of you, I relate to you the most,” she said. 

The silence told her he was listening, and knowing him his eyebrows had likely risen into his hairline. “You didn’t choose to delve into a sin; you were born as fury and tumbled into the Devildom. I know it’s certainly not the same...but I didn’t choose to arrive here, or most other things in life, and yet here we are, making the best of things, learning as much as we can.” She gave herself a weak smile. Where had the strong woman she’d been last week gone, replaced by this crude and useless self-pity? Maybe she should have just crawled back into bed.

“After the first two weeks, what changed?” he asked quietly, as if she were a feral cat about to run.

She wanted to curl in on herself at the sudden softness. He was far too observant for her comfort, but fleeing the invasive question would mean moving, and she’d only just gotten her feet warm. “You mean why did I stop cowering after I arrived?” She heard him shift in his seat. “I came to the conclusion, quite quickly, that there was no way I would survive this year. After that, I spent the next couple of weeks trying to figure out how to escape, and when I realized it was all out of my control, I decided to try and enjoy the last few months, or weeks, or days, of my life.” 

A sharp pop came from the fire and something struck the sole of her foot. She recoiled from the heat of the ember, but she found herself in Satan’s lap before she could swat it away. Her left leg bent up onto her right knee, the arch of her foot was in Satan’s hands, and he dusted away the soot and her surprise without comment.

“Then you idiots started to grow on me.” She poked him in the chest with her finger. “Stockholm syndrome is serious business.” When he didn’t release her foot she wiggled it and gave him a pointed look. “Just like in all of the versions of Beauty and the Beast, I started to sympathize with the motivations of devils.” The warm buzzing in her chest at Satan’s closeness highlighted her plight unpleasantly.

“And love them?” he asked, cocking one eyebrow.

How arrogant of him. “That’s how the story goes,” she said with a tilt of her head, letting her eyes trail away from him and back to the fire. Maybe all of them  _ were _ naturally touchy if even Satan would move her without hesitation.

“Is that why you’re so reckless?”

She wrinkled her nose at him purposefully and obviously before she pulled back her foot. “If you mean why I run from death as often as possible, unless it means protecting one of you, then yes.”

“How very droll of you.”

“Satan.” She smooshed his face between her hands, wiggling his cheeks to get her point across. “There are a myriad of ways that I could die just from neglect alone.” The glare he was brewing was hot enough that she relinquished her hold on him, and she pushed the hair back from her face, running her fingers through it again and again to soothe her discomfort. When he didn’t turn her into a toad right away she continued, like a surprisingly comfortable Scheherazade. He never could skewer her when he wanted to know more. “Some of them are even considered torturous. Left alone for long enough humans go mad or listless. Killing ourselves in either state is possible.” 

She dismounted from his lap and sat on the floor between the side table and the dragon, finding a primal comfort in leaning over her knees and over-grooming her hair. It didn’t matter that he saw it now; he already knew she was unravelling. “If we have no sunlight it’ll happen faster. If we have no means of exercise it’ll happen even faster. We lose the ability to speak and think properly. It degrades our minds...I have so many more concerns than just what  _ you _ consider recklessness.” Dropping her head into her hands, she tried to muster the energy to feel guilt over snapping at him but it wouldn’t come.

He looked perplexed, when she peeked at him, his hand risen to his chest as if mildly insulted. “Is that why you befriended us? To avoid madness?”

Laughing at the notion, she showed her teeth as she threw her head back. “I think befriending you all invited madness! But, no, humans are herd animals. We’ll anthropomorphize robots and rocks, and adopt any species.” The weave of the rug caught uncomfortably against her dress when she flopped backward once more, stretching the fabric over her clothed belly as she raised her hands far above her head in surrender. “We pack bond for comfort and safety, whether we want to or not.” 

The mirth left her eyes while she stared through the ceiling. “I’m just another slave to my baser instincts. No different from you.” The beginnings of a lopsided smile began to curve up one side of her mouth. “Although, humans might have a better sense of humour. We _ did  _ sing happy birthday to a space rover on Mars.”

Off the chair before she knew it, he slid to the floor next to her, crouching over her like a child with a magnifying glass would with a nest of ants. “Would you have changed anything?” he asked.

“I would’ve appreciated a primer before being tossed into the deep end, maybe a bit of a warmer welcome. Otherwise, no. I wouldn’t change anything.” She said with a hint of humour and picked at a bit of fluff on the rug at her fingertips above. “I don’t have anything to go back to anyway, just monotony and loneliness.” 

“What a nice speedy change from existential dread to regular old dread,” he said. “Ever the optimist.”

She couldn’t see him as well now but she knew he was still there, somewhere near her knee. “Hmm. You’re right, I should find more silver lining.” A part of her still ached for home. “I found an amazing cat with wings. I got to fly, even if I was unconscious. I can say I have befriended the most stubborn creatures in the three realms. I’ve seen magic, and I finally managed to get laid. All in all, almost worth the casual dismemberment.”

“Growth and comfort do not coexist,” Satan tutted. “What is the human saying you have?” he asked. “You must welcome change as the rule, but not as your ruler?”

Based on the sway of the pant legs she spied, her derisive snort made him flinch. “Helpful. I’ll get right on changing my perception once you’ve figured out how to solve the Devildom’s xenophobia.”

“How would you start?”

“Oooooh, maybe a one to one ratio of counsellors and psychologists? I mean, you’d have to find a way to prolong their lives first so that they could spend the first decade realizing that they’re not insane, and then the rest of time working through the inner demons of demons.” 

“Yes, we’re not big on psychology unless it’s how to gain the upper hand.”

“Wouldn’t it be worthwhile to gain the upper hand and disarm your _ own _ shortcomings?”

“Lucifer considered sending Mammon to a psychologist for his kleptomania,” Satan said quickly.

A distraction, but she wouldn’t pry. “Really? What stopped him?”

“You arrived.”

“Oh.” She didn’t know how she felt about that. “Have you tried hugging him? That seems to work for me.” The pit in her stomach was trying to make itself known again. When was the last time she’d hugged Mammon and they hadn’t argued?

“Would you like to see our version of therapy?” Satan asked.

She felt a warmth surround her, as if she’d stepped into the hot air dryers of a carwash. Sensations like that no longer halted her exchanges, but the fuzzy warmth in her chest at finding her dress to now be dry gave way to trepidation. “‘Our’ as in demonkind, or ‘our’ as in this household?” 

“Well, mine, if we’re being specific.”

“Colour me intrigued, however, my puny hominid brain is suggesting it may not be healthy for mortals.”

“Would you like to visit the breaking room?”

She rapidly drew her arms back down to prop herself up on her elbows. “Oh, then yes. I keep hearing about it. Should I bring a baseball bat, or does that come with the tour?”

He laughed loudly and offered her a hand up. “Come on. I promised Rancor some treats, but then we can go out back.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:  
> The poem, ‘We Drink at the Attenuation Well’, is by Porsha Olayiwola and can be heard performed here: https://dcs.megaphone.fm/POETS1219141149.mp3?key=10f73bdde505a8cd4fd53c5d81a93528
> 
> The second poem: https://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/nobody-knows-6


	114. The Breaking Room

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC finally gets to see inside the mysterious Breaking Room
> 
> 48th Day, Friday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Massive thank you to Sarchopathic and ElvishDork for their beta reading efforts.

She looked delicate and dreamy as Satan led her into the backyard, as if someone had only given half a life to her. Would it be wise to bring her here? If nothing else the breaking room would be a quiet place no one else would venture to intrude upon. The room would stay mostly inert without his command, but she was an unknown variable in the calculation, with too many possibilities. 

Shaking off his concern, he tromped through what passed for a back garden. Rest from their chaos was what she truly needed. If it came wrapped up as an interesting field trip for her, all the better; he wouldn’t have to drag her down there for her to escape and clear her head.

“This is it,” he said, gesturing grandly to the small outbuilding. She’d seen it before, he knew, but this would be her first actual visit inside. From the exterior it was the same darkstone as the house, lacking only the height and windows. Not to his taste, but it was what was inside that mattered.

Her polite nod gave nothing away of her feelings on the lack of pomp, but when he pressed his hand against the masonry her eyes lit up as the mortar between stones began to glow. It pleased him to no end that even little shows of magic could still bring a bit of life back to her.

Taking her good hand in his, he led her inside the open jaws of the wall, and down a steep incline. He only conjured a light to bobble ahead of them when she stumbled behind him. “Almost there.”

“I didn’t realize it was underground,” she said.   
  
“It allows for more layers of...protection,” Satan said. Not for him of course, but anything outside of the room that might wander too close. “Lucifer and Diavolo made it for me when I was small.” He felt her hand squeeze his and he wasn’t sure what to think of the tight lump it created in his throat.

When she began to lag, he turned to her, studying her closely with the utility globe between them. “I've got a feeling that you might be too tired, after today's incident, to enjoy the splendour of the breaking room if I have you walk the rest of the way,” he said after giving her a once over. She’d perked up considerably under the light, like a plant searching out the sun. He should have considered this sooner.

She shrugged and nodded. “I can’t promise I’ll put on a polite smile for it either way. I’m beyond weary today.”

That wouldn’t do. He picked her up without further discussion and she didn’t make a sound, not even an inhale of breath. Very concerning. He continued walking with her in his arms but she wasn’t admiring the perfectly carved hall around them. “It's embarrassing when you stare at me like that…” he said.

“I wouldn’t know what that’s like at all,” she said dryly, but closed her eyes nonetheless.

He hazard to move at his own pace once he knew she wasn’t looking. Having her curled up against his chest for longer would have been nice, but he wasn’t opening the vault for himself today. 

The doors creaked open of their own accord and he set her down. He looked between her and the utility orb he’d sent to hover in the middle of the domed space. She hadn’t removed her hands from his chest, still partially turned toward him, even as she watched the globe illuminate different parts of the room. It was nice to be her balance, even if only when she was tired.

“You have a bunker,” she said without inflection.

“Come on,” he said, ushering her inside before his irritation could make its way to the surface. With a snap of his fingers the doors clanged shut loudly behind them and the light went out. “Imagine somewhere beautiful and calm,” he said and placed his hands on her bare shoulders. “Imagine every little detail, the scent, the air, how it sounds...got it?”

She nodded in the dark, and he reached out to the room, pulling her sensations with him. He could tell when she felt the change in the atmosphere; all of the tension ran out of her shoulders. The air was humid and warm. Bird calls he wasn’t familiar with rang out, sounding as if they were in the open air instead of echoing off his cell walls.

“Open your eyes,” he said. He leaned down to whisper it, cognizant of her startle reflex and how she already swayed on the spot. In awe, he watched golden sunlight highlight the lines of a lush forest, every leaf vein magnified by dew. Even the birdsong changed its rhythm as her eyes opened to the world. “Beautiful,” he said. He’d always known his mistress had a beautiful mind, and now he could see a part of it.

“Can I…” she asked, one of her knees already bending to advance.

“Go to,” he said happily, and this time his smile reached his eyes. The warmth of it filled him to his toes. He watched her run to a deer trail, alert and eager for what might lie around the corner. When she doubled back, lifting her hemline to wade in a gentle stream, he conjured a wide, dry, mossy seat for himself and pulled a book from his back pocket.

After the first few minutes of reading and re-reading, he gave up. It failed to hold his interest compared to her frolicking. He pretended to read so as not to disturb her exploration and, eventually, she returned to his side, either tired or lonesome, he wasn’t sure which. “Better?” he asked.

“Much,” she said. A healthy glow had returned to her face.

“I’m glad.”

“But, _ this  _ is where you took Beel?” she asked. The incredulous expression she had was lost in her ungraceful flop onto the moss next to him. “I was expecting office printers lined up like piñatas and rows of golf clubs and bats. Not...this.” Her awe, as she looked up at the illusion of a blue sky, was what kept him from laughing at her.

“I never said it was to get aggression out. It can be, but it’s also a place of relaxation if needed.”

“Like Levi’s water ceiling and aquariums, then.”

“Yes, I suppose it is a type of sensory modulation...” Given its ability to constantly change, he’d never considered how similar this must be to Leviathan’s room, but if he included the many game worlds, this really was no different. Alarming. “I had Beel break rocks until he tired himself out,” Satan said. No need to dwell on that.

She nodded but said nothing. It seemed there were things she didn’t want to talk about either. It would be folly to ask what was wrong; nothing had gone right for her since Lord Diavolo had summoned her. 

“Hey Satan,” she asked, her eyes closed against the sun. “When I die, will you plant flowers on my grave?”

“How efficient of you,” he said to buy himself time to comprehend the sudden shift in conversation.

“I prefer thrifty,” she said. Her fingers sunk into the moss and flexed. “No point in continually buying flowers.”

“You’d want me to bring flowers?” He didn’t want to bring any flowers, ever.

“No, I want you to pick them from my grave.” She opened her eyes and it felt like she was staring into the very center of him. “That way you can take a bit of me home with you again.”

It was clear they needed to find a lasting solution to her malaise. ‘False sunlight and greenery will only go so far,’ he thought. He closed his book. “Let’s make you immortal instead, that way you can pick the flowers yourself.”

The eyeroll he received was not flattering to his ego.

“You say it as if it’s so easy.”

“Easy, no. Possible, yes.”

“Plausible, no. You think Khanum Yimuo will take a litch apprentice sometime this century?” she asked, her voice pitched low and sarcastic.

“I hope not,” he said with a frown. “Besides, it’s  _ Princess _ Yimuo,” he said. “Gōngzhǔ would be the more appropriate title.”

“Yeah?” she asked. “You try telling her you want to call her by a more formal title after she demands you be chummy. I’m not risking it.”

“She _ is _ formidable,” he said with raised eyebrows and a knowing nod. Certainly not his first choice if they were looking at immortality; she was a terrible dinner guest.

“Besides,” she said, taking up a bizarre tune, “when I'm necromancin', everyone's dancin', No one can stop me. I dare you to try.” She raised her hands toward him and wiggled her fingers, much as Leviathan had done earlier with bared claws. “The dead are infused with sensational groove, And they're coming for you now, There's nowhere to hide!”

He rolled his eyes at her playful display. “I’m sure there’s an easier way than becoming a litch,” he said. He wet his lower lip before pressing his lips together in thought. The environment was too humid to warrant it, but his well of detachment had run dry. It was a puerile motion that telegraphed his concern too openly for his liking. 

‘There are no wrong emotions in the breaking room,’ he reminded himself. It was a tenant of the room that wouldn’t change just because she was here. If anything, her presence was a greater reason to shed his exterior. He wanted her to see behind the mask, and to know he could still take it off, if only in pieces at a time.

Even so, he attempted to be nonchalant about his rationale. “Besides, I prefer you warm.” The heat of his ears told him he was failing miserably. Ease of sharing so blatantly like this would take time. 

It was enough to have piqued her interest. The disquiet in her eyes fully fled in deference to her curiosity. “Oh, what else do you prefer?” she asked.

He watched her expression flicker like a strobe light between curiosity and shyness. There was a hint of uncertainty that he didn’t enjoy. But what did he prefer? Biting his tongue for a moment he tapped his book against his chest. Bravery imagined for the future was useless if he couldn’t wield it in the present. “I prefer to  _ know  _ that your affection is real rather than a required cordiality.”

He watched the shock of his words strike her and she recoiled a few inches from him, drawing herself back from their intimate bubble. It was a shorter time than he expected before she resettled, only seconds. 

Instead of stuttered excuses from her to buy time, she spoke immediately. “Then we are the same. You probably also enjoy being compared to Lucifer about as much as I like being seen as a replacement for Lilith.”

It was now his turn to wince. How quickly they could sum one another up. Skirting away from  _ that _ particular pit of feelings, he traded one vulnerability for another. “I prefer when you give me your attention as freely as you do with my brothers.”

“Perhaps you shouldn’t swat me with books if you want more affection,” she said, now laughing and prodding at him.

His heels touched the ground, and he realized he’d raised his knees so that his toes had been pointed into the moss with the strength of his apprehension. Seeing that bit of mirth returned to her was a rush of relief. “Yes, of course, you’re right,” he said with the utmost seriousness he could muster. “I feel terrible about that; even Asmo’s skincare periodicals don’t deserve to be treated so carelessly.” 

He quickly found himself being assaulted by some sort of fern, while she fwipped it to and fro in his face, leaving fronds in his hair. 

“You won’t get the same reactions or closeness,” she said, releasing the fern in favour of shuffling closer to his side, “if you always hide behind your wit.” She tapped his nose with her grubby finger. “Just tell me what you feel when you feel it. It’s as easy as that.”

Her closeness wasn’t oppressive, but he couldn’t look away from her. If he blinked, she might wilt away before he knew it. He wanted to stare at her in this tiny pocket of time for as long as she would allow. “I’m not sure if what I feel is what everyone else feels,” he said. His mouth felt too dry.

This time her smile for him was mocking but her hand landing on his forearm kept him from retreating. “You know no one knows if they feel the same as others do, but you’re one of the few to dwell upon it so deeply.”

“Yes, well: he who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool; shun him.”

“Confucious,” she murmured more to herself than to him. “And what will happen if you claim to have an emotion and you’re wrong?”

The question took him by surprise. “I…” At worst, he could mislead others or perhaps not realize he’d lied to himself. Either would be embarrassing, the latter by far the worst of the two. 

“What would the consequences be?” she asked, as serious and pointed in her questions as in any of the debates he’d engaged in with Hierocles or Ruskin. “You’d be judged? You’d feel foolish? Perhaps guilty?” She continued to stare at him, her eyes half-lidded now. “And?”

“It sounds moronic…” he said, trying not to ball up his fists at the idea of it, “but I hate wasting my time.”

She snickered at him, but quickly sobered when he slid his arm out of her reach. “When you’re creating a new curse, is everything before your success a waste of time?”

“We both know it’s not,” he said sullenly. He knew that he had unlimited time. It only made it worse to hear her say it. “I see what you’re doing. I’m well aware that all experiences are primers and give context to future solutions.”

“But they don’t apply to _ you, _ ” she said softly. It might as well have been the bite of a whip.

He opened and closed his mouth.

“It’s either a standard you apply across the board,” she said, jabbing him in the chest, “or not at all. There are no exceptions.” She pushed him flat, the environment warping to let him lay back. “Stop making up ways to fail yourself, my caterpillar.”

“Excuse you,” he said as she scrambled over his supine form like a playful bear cub. He had said he wanted her affection as freely given to him as with the others; it seemed that would have to include the assertiveness that came with it. “I’m clearly the purple cat with the toothy grin.”

“You’re afraid,” she said. There was no judgement in her words. 

“Of what?” he asked, askance despite her certainty. “What could  _ I  _ possibly be afraid of?”

She leaned in closer to tell him the secret. “I see you and your fear of failure.”

His laughter shook them both. “I fear failure so I fail myself again and again?” he asked, once more amused by the strangeness of their exchanges. She always had such a different perspective.

“You create failures which only you control,” she whispered against his ear, inhaling sharply when he brought his arms around her to anchor himself. “You never reach the junctures of failure and success that are out of your control.”

Silently, he lay there, playing her words through his head. How easily she sliced through his window dressing. He paid no mind as the world around them shifted so that moss became purple upholstery under him, and he kept her held tightly against him until he was sure she recognized the chair from his room.

Inhaling slowly and deeply, he took in the scent of lake water in her hair, and something else that he associated with the twins. It irked him. ‘Fortune favours the bold,’ he thought. “I don’t know what the emotion is, but I want you to call on me. I want to be someone who can make you smile when you feel like this.”

Unwilling to release her and see the full expression she might have for his confession, he settled for feeling her smile against his cheek. One of his hands slid down her side and he moved to caress her lower back. It was no different than petting a new cat’s belly for the first time: he was cautious and unhurried.

“I don’t think we’re far off from that.” she said. “After all, you’re the only one I called after The Fall.”

“I’m not so sure of that.” It was something he wanted to believe, but everything he saw told him it wasn’t true. 

Slowly, she pulled away. “Are you calling me a liar?” There was no anger in her gaze yet. It was a question, a testing of his intent rather than his wording.

“I prefer magically naïve,” he said. 

She didn’t look any less impressed with his technicality, but she hadn’t moved off of his lap either. 

“You’re inventive and you find ways to use magic that many would never consider, and it’s because you lack...no,” he said, gripping her waist with a flex of his fingers that made her jump. “it’s because you have a _different_ perspective on magic.”

She was letting him ramble, giving him the same confused and concerned look Rancor often did when he thought aloud to find a solution.

“What I mean to say is that I think you try to reach out to us often, but you either lack the ‘muscle memory’ or the magic required to do it effectively.”

“Hmm,” she said, “like Infernal speech.” 

He tried to discover her meaning through hints of body language but she gave him nothing more. He was completely flummoxed. Speech had nothing to do with magic other than perhaps a choice of focusing mantras. His obvious showing of perplexity did nothing to derail her initial train of thought either.

“So,” she asked, that damn eyebrow arching once more in disapproval, “you feel slighted that I probably reached out for the others while I was dying and not just you?”

The tips of his fingers flexed against her ribs again yet she made no indication she felt it, continuing to stare him down. 

“No,” he said, trying to remember when his hands had started to rise up her torso. He could tell she wasn’t trying to drag this out uncomfortably, but in fairness he was meandering to his point. This was precisely why emotions were so difficult. They always muddied everything. “I meant that I think you called Mammon while using some of Lucifer’s magic.”

The very idea that she could do so made him ecstatic but he hated that she’d turned to Lucifer, and he hugged her tightly to him again, likely pressing her face into the chair’s back.

She snorted in air as she laughed.

“I’m serious.”

“Do you know how crazy that sounds?” she asked, forcing her arms between them so that she could sit back again.

“You clearly have traces of his magic in you,” he said, trying and failing not to look sour about it. He might be being petulant, but Lucifer’s magic in her skin was still an observable fact.

Thrusting her bandaged hand under his nose, her lip curled unpleasantly. “It’s probably just this.”

“Yes, Belphegor mentioned that while you were asleep.”

The quick narrowing of her eyes told him she was displeased. That eyebrow was beginning to inch higher.

“Even I need time to think and study a problem,” Satan said and jostled her in his lap. It seemed to startle her out of her fixed annoyance. He’d seen Asmodeus do it before. Simple cause and effect: a change in environment could influence a change in behaviour. “Even Mammon came to me last week concerned about you using magic without noticing.” He cleared his throat, “and perhaps some of our magic as well.”

She glanced away, skittering her eyes over the changed room around them while she searched her memory, probably for instances of such that she would have missed. 

“It’s likely nothing to fear,” he said, lifting his heels and dropping them once more to bounce her. Why had he never done this before? The satisfaction of having her weight shifting in his lap could easily become an addiction.

“Not  _ likely, _ ” she said. “I suspect that trying to find you, only to end up drowning in the lake, isn’t exactly harmless either.”

Of course she would fixate on probability rather than severity. “Think of it like a seed: a little pit of energy buried deep.” He pinched his fingers together for show. “When it’s shocked by the Devildom and germinates in the warmth of magic around it, the little cotyledon bursts forth a shoot.” He spread his fingers apart like a firework. “And it finds its way to the surface.” It would make a good children’s book: ‘The littlest cotyledon.’

“How did we get to ‘you’re poaching my photosynthesis’ from ‘I want you to rely on me?’” she asked with a tired sort of amusement.

The heat in his cheeks told him to make light of it and tell her something interesting about the sun, suggest they travel to Lord Diavolo’s personal beach for some real sunlight, anything but crack open his ribs a little wider for her to see more of his heart. “If you’re going to use any of your pacts to fuel your magical growth then...then it should be our pact...” he said. 

It was the truth. He was well suited to it: his magic poured into her without hindrance, he could think ahead to stem most disasters she might conjure, and he’d tutored her before. But it wasn’t the whole truth. “...not Lucifer’s.”

She blinked at him as though he’d told her a tautology was wrong. “I don’t have a pact with Lucifer,” she said cautiously as if she must’ve heard him wrong.

“How else would you acquire such an oath?” he asked, securing her injured hand for his inspection again.

Clearing her throat she glanced away, red faced, and held her breath.

A spike of jealousy drove itself through him and nailed him to the chair. ‘Was Asmodeus right? Were all of the bruises and bites Mammon spied on her body Lucifer’s work?’ He wanted to hide her in here forever and protect her from Lucifer while he taught her everything he knew.

“I told him he was an idiot for a while, and tore out some of his feathers.” She cleared her throat awkwardly. “I stabbed him with his own horn and then tried to gouge his eyes out,” she said sheepishly and rubbed her freehand behind her ear, “and then I threw kitsch at him until he made tea. After that, there was a surprise oath. Still not sure what to do with it.”

A sick laughter tried to bubble out of Satan at the imagery she painted. Yet, it couldn’t compete with his need to be sure. “ _ This _ is a new layer of Lucifer’s magic,” he said, unwinding the linen wrap. “There are other specks, little strands that tether you together besides this.” He paused to look at the jagged scab. “They’re nothing as strong as our pact, but I thought...his pacts are different, it wouldn’t have been given freely like mine was.”

“I’m pretty sure I would know if I was in a pact before, or now, given that I rejected his offer of a pact over tea,” she said, vehemently. Each word impacted as if she were dropping Hanuman's mace on his shoulders.

He felt the crackle of indignation inside of her. 

“You what?” Satan whispered.

“I guess it wasn’t really an offer,” she said, slipping back into a slugatude Satan associated more with Belphegor. “I just kind of weathered the pressure until Lucifer moved off to avoid losing an eye.” She tilted her head to the side, her eyes dim and unprocessing as she wiggled her injured hand in his grasp. “That’s how I ended up with this instead.”

Too focused on the ember of wrath inside her, he hadn’t allowed himself to consider his own reaction and the world crashed down around them in thunder and the dark clouds of his rage. He was familiar with Lucifer’s idea of a pact. 

The pressure around his ribs tightened, only for him to realize that it was his mistress clinging to him in fright. Breathing deeply, he tried to save the urge to rend for another time. He’d deliver her safely back to one of his brothers before allowing himself that. His tail continued to move behind him, clacking the armoured vertebrae as it whipped through the air. 

If she were to cleave any closer to him she’d be hiding under his shirt.

Bowing his head, he breathed in the stale scent of her shampoo and human scalp. ‘She’s safe. She doesn’t belong to Lucifer,’ he thought. She’d come to him for help. He pressed his lips silently to her crown and willed the room back to something calm. It wouldn’t do to have her afraid in his presence, much less in his arms. 

Whatever this emotion was called, he felt it intensely.

“Satan?”

He cleared his throat and released her from his own tight hold, prepared to pretend nothing had happened. “I’d better take a look at you then.”

When she stepped back it was to give him a look that plainly said “Oh, really?”

‘Thistlegorm and twigspittle!’ The only fucking thing to manifest in the whole cavern was his rickety bed, complete with underframe book-avalanche and rope.

“Just sit down,” he said, exasperated. “It’s a place of comfort!” 

When she sat without argument he almost sighed with relief. Instead, he palpated her forearms with his thumbs, working his way up to her shoulder only to lift one of her muddy feet, before moving on once more. If they were busy solving something neither of them could overthink or overfeel.

“Ask first!” she said, squirming as he turned her head to look in her ears.

“Phlegmatic and melancholic,” he said, all business and inquiry now that he had something other than himself to focus on. “Not a surprise given the time of year on Earth, or your exposure to the dark and cold here.” He glanced at the newest love bites on her skin and hazarded a peak beneath one of her shoulder straps before dodging her swatting hand. “But you’re surprisingly unbalanced toward the cold, even for one of your sex.”

“Phlegmatic?” was all she seemed able to get out. “Are you kidding me right now?”

“Not at all,” he said, his hand on his chin, fingers tapping at his mouth while he considered solutions. “The old sciences weren’t wrong, merely taken to extremes. That and your people’s bizarre obsession with symmetry.” They were back to a dynamic he was more comfortable with: surprised and agog vs historical fact. “After the basics of grammar, logic, and rhetoric, scholars learned the quadrivium: arithmetic, geometry, music and astrology.” He eyed her up once more before crouching in front of her. He knew she knew that, but she was letting him talk, waiting to see where this would go. “Hmm. In the Northern hemisphere, you should be somewhere between aquarius and pisces right now, although with the wobble, it might actually be aries…” He tapped at his chin. “The problem might be somewhere between your knees and your feet, or possibly in your head.”

“You’re off your rocker!” she said, moving to get up, despite him being directly in her way. “If you think I’m going to let you bleed me, I’ll stab you too.”

He rolled his eyes at her and sat back on his haunches to give her space and to better assess her as a whole. “I’m not going to bleed you. However, how  _ do  _ you want me to treat you?” he asked. Sometimes the delivery method was as important as the medicine.

“I…” She looked at him with confusion and slowly sat back down. “I don’t know.”

She looked like Henry the goldfish, lips moving without any useful answers, leaning forward slightly with an idea just at the tip of her tongue before slouching back again. She always had so many answers for them, for him, but none for herself. 

And suddenly it all made sense. He’d been a fool in the dark.  _ This _ was why she hadn’t immediately presented him with her bloody hand; for once, she needed someone to pick her path and lead her down it. ‘It’s outside her realm of experience.’ He sped through the possibilities. ‘It’s that, or her experience hasn’t resulted in unobjectionable outcomes before.’ The probability of his theory being correct was growing rapidly as he crossed off each branch:

Lucifer would drag her down whichever path he deemed best, and she had recently stabbed him over it. 

Mammon and Leviathan would be too afraid to do more than comfort her, and even that might be asking too much of them. 

Asmodeus would try to coax her into distraction but it wouldn’t last. She’d quickly see past it for the bandage it was. 

Beelzebub tried to hide that he worshipped the ground she walked on, but anyone who knew him well could tell. Seeing her hurt would crush him, and she likely knew it. A successful outcome there would be difficult to come by. Certainly, Beelzebub had more life experience, but she applied her short experience to intangible ideas with an alacrity and flexibility that would likely outpace Beelzebub, only his immense patience would see them through. 

That left Belphegor. As much trust as she seemed to bestow upon him, Satan had heard the warped music overhead when she thought of him. She knew it could end in something dark. He shivered at the memory of the sound: obsessive and hidden. Belphegor would let her go too far down whatever path he chose. 

So, she had come here.

“You okay in there?” she asked, tapping her finger against his temple.

Somehow, it didn’t make him feel like her last or only option. He knew she was proud enough to keep this to herself, that she’d break apart before willingly going to one of his comrades. She’d still  _ chosen _ to come to him. It was he who got to see her rocking back and forth and fidgeting with her hair. She trusted him with her fragile pieces.

Brushing her hand away, he reached under the bed, ignoring the way she jerked backward when he leaned into her space and between her legs to do so. “I know what to do,” he said evenly and pulled out the rope. “Let’s make a deal.”

She couldn’t have looked more surprised. “Why, my good sir,” she said, her hand doing a poor job of covering her mischievous smile, “I thought you’d never ask.”

Holding out the rope, as if he were presenting a sword on the flat of his palms, he said, “The deal is that, in here, we’ll both do our best to drop our defenses.” 

Just as he had when she’d tested her hypothesis against Mammon, he watched her body language and the quick way her eyes moved with her thoughts. “Even the humorous shields we favour,” he said, and watched her eyes narrow.

Her observation of him was equally unwavering while she considered his proposal. Undisguised suspicion came along with each strum of her fingers over the illusion of his bedsheets, a rhythm of calculation. The atmosphere was similar to when he played chess with Diavolo, except neither of them were playing to win here, only not to lose.

“Satan, Fourth Lord of the Devildom,” she said after a time, and placed her uninjured hand over one of his, “Lord of Masks, I accept your deal.” 

A hint of his own energy left her hand and slipped into his, shocking him such that he almost dropped both the rope and her hand.

“So.” she said, tilting her head back to look down at him. Her eyes were soft despite her smug smile. “Which one of us is the rope bunny?”

“I am  _ not  _ the rope bunny.”


	115. Ropework

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Satan helps MC work through some issues

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchophatic for their beta reading and support.

“I don’t usually advocate for tying when there’s been a great deal of stress, because it can lead to some very unfortunate consequences,” Satan said, as he began wrapping the rope around her ankle, looping it to circle low on her thigh, “however, when done carefully, without additional stimulus, it can be an excellent therapy.”

“Should I be asking for your credentials?” she asked, half joking and half serious as she let him tie her up on the illusion of his bed.

“I started practicing when it was still known as hojōjutsu if that means anything to you,” he said. He was smiling but completely focused on his work, testing tension and smoothing out lines to sit the knots between knee and ankle into one perfectly spaced column. 

It did. Whether that was comforting was another matter. She wasn’t sure she wanted to end up hogtied like a criminal. Then again, she’d rather have a row of knots down her leg then have him exsanguinate her. Was that why Lucifer called him a leech?

“You see,” he continued, “it's my opinion, that the true bondage is trauma.” He paused to admire his work before he moved to her other leg. “Damage doesn't just stay in the psyche but also in the physical body, no matter how many times you regenerate it.”

Her legs began to tremble in the restraints and he set the rope down.

“We can stop at any time,” he said.

She swallowed, suddenly too warm and clammy. “I feel weird,” she said haltingly.

“I can easily cut this off,” he said, and lifted her hand to his shoulder. “Or we can relax through this together.”

Following the line of her hand to his shoulder drew her attention away from the sudden oppressive feeling and she breathed a sigh of relief. “Sorry, that doesn’t usually…” There were still strange tingles in her spine and neck but it was manageable.

“Nothing to apologize for,” he said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if that had happened to someone who  _ hasn’t  _ been assaulted. It would be frightening to me if you were unresponsive.”

The steady swish of the rope hadn’t returned and she looked at him properly. “Keep going.”

For a moment he didn’t move, but he must’ve found whatever it was that he was looking for because he returned to his work, and her breathing became as even and rhythmic as his movements. 

Each drag as he pulled the rope through a knot brought her further into an unguarded place. “You do this a lot then?” she asked.

“No,” Satan said, “only when the occasion calls for it.”

Her eyes went wide, first with surprise that her professor might actually be a closet pervert, and then with concern as she considered the horrible things he might’ve done with his knowledge and skill.

“Don’t look like I said I’m going to put you on a spike,” Satan said with a laugh. “Tell me about our acquaintances. Keep me entertained.”

“Hmm,” she said, while letting Satan rearrange her skirt to maintain her modesty and presumably to avoid later discomfort. “It sounds like Mammon was different before the fall, even in the early years after the fall. He was still absent minded and prone to daydreaming, but it sounds like his executive functioning wasn’t always this poor.” She sighed heavily. “I often find myself wondering if half of his bad behaviour isn’t just depression and lack of self esteem.” Walking her fingers up Satan’s arm, from elbow to shoulder, she flicked him before retreating. “You should be nicer to him.”

Satan gave a noncommittal noise and wrapped his arms around her, making the first pass behind her back for the beginnings of a harness. 

It felt like a hug: warm and tender. She closed her eyes and relaxed into the clockwork of his temporary embraces. 

“Levi?” Satan asked, when she failed to continue.

“Levi...he’s intellectual when you give him a chance to talk about things he’s interested in, but he has poor social skills, struggles to communicate.”

“All very accurate observations,” Satan said. “Push up against my hand with your foot?” When she showed no concerning reactions he nodded for her to continue. 

“He’s actually quite artistic and not just with his cosplays,” she said. She felt herself smile widely, only then realizing she must’ve closed her eyes at some point. The sound of surf nearby didn’t surprise her. If Satan were thinking of Leviathan, it made sense. “He doesn’t show anyone his drawings but he’s quite good.”

“I had no idea,” Satan said. “Hands together in front of you, please.”

“At home, if he were human, I’d think we’d probably say he has asperger’s syndrome. It’s a shame there’re no programs here to help make dealing with us normies less of a hassle.”

“I didn’t realize anyone besides me would be playing doctor,” Satan said. 

She laughed off his words but stopped from retorting in kind. They’d promised to drop their defenses here. “My brother had something similar,” she said. “He always told me music helped the most, made everything else more manageable.” 

The rope no longer moved around her arms, but she still heard the slide of it in Satan’s hands. What was it made of? It felt like almost nothing when it touched her, too soft by far to be an Earth based fibre.

“And Beel?” he asked. Satan slid his hands down from her shoulders to her elbows, bringing them closer together before he moved to the next knot.

“If he doesn’t have an eating disorder then we’re not in the Devildom.” She frowned at the laugh Satan gave in return. “I don’t find it very funny,” she said seriously. She almost felt hurt on his behalf. “He binges perpetually, feels guilty about it, then works out nonstop until he either eats or passes out from not eating.”

“Or rampages from not eating,” Satan said lightly, ignoring the way the room around them pulsed a ruddy orange and rumbled enough to shake the bed frame. “Shall I continue?”

Looking down at herself, all trussed up, she should have felt uncertain, but she shrugged, still able to move her shoulders. “Please,” she said. It felt sort of soothing, like a tight hug or a heavy blanket in the winter.

“Asmo, then.” Satan supported her back as he slid the rope under her arms and between her breasts.

“Deep seated need for recognition and love. Puts up a similar facade to Mammon’s” she said rapid fire.

“A bit harsh,” Satan said, but it wasn’t a reprimand. 

She appreciated that about him. He was always willing to listen to an observation before judging it, at least usually he was. Alternate opinions on the merits of ‘The Mid-Fall Murders’ were usually met with as much vitriol as if she’d told Leviathan Ruri-chan was ugly.

Tilting her head to rest against her own shoulder, she slowly opened her eyes, now nearly nose to nose with him. There was a nice warmth here: he was close enough that she could feel the heat of him without touching. She felt no guilt in breaking the moment. It felt fluid and easy, like the room around them. “Really, does that chin tuck say otherwise?” 

His laughter was instantaneous, and she leaned into him when he dropped his forehead against her arm. “I didn’t think you would know about that,” he finally choked out when his shaking gasps of mirth settled.

It was more than comfortable like this. Sleepiness didn’t quite describe it. She’d be happy to stay like this with him. As he raised his head, tears at the corners of his eyes, she shifted her weight and kissed him, just the barest brush of lips.

When he didn’t move she pressed her mouth against the softness of his lips a second time. It felt good not to think, to just feel. This felt right. Safe.

“You're not exactly motivating me to get back to work…” Satan said, with barely space for air to pass between them. “But, I will restrain myself for now.” 

He was still staring at her lips so she smiled, enjoying the heady feeling that made her wiggle her fingers and toes.

“With great power comes great responsibility,” he said. It sounded like he was coaching himself.

“Spider-man?” she asked. Her voice had gone high and squeaky with disbelief but she couldn’t find it in herself to be bothered by it. He was watching her unravel and tying her back together. What was a single squeak to him?

“Not quite. The origin of the quotation goes back to the French National Convention in 1793.” 

His chuckle was as warming to her as his breath had been against her neck. It made the room peachy, like sunset. 

“The British Parliament under Lamb, as well as Sir Churchill, dittoed the sentiment in 1817 and 1906, respectively.”

“Uh-huh.”

He began to draw another line up, this time toward her clavicle and she flinched.

“Wait,” she said and licked at her lips, trying to make words to match the sudden tension that ran through her. “Nothing at the neck.”

His eyes said he understood.“Of course,” and then, after a pause, “What about me?”

He seemed uncomfortable. His hands didn’t fumble as he tucked away the last of the rope into the other knots, but the rhythm to his movement had changed. 

“You’re practically human with how you adapt,” she whispered, uncertain about how either of them would or should feel about that revelation.

“I think that’s enough about us,” Satan said gently.

It didn’t go unnoticed by her that he never asked about Lucifer or Belphegor.

She scrunched up her brow, looking up beyond Satan’s right shoulder. There was a little flash of light, like an old timey camera bulb. There it was again. A pressure in her eardrums told her there should have been a sound. The room was empty of noise but the click of the shutter-stop never arrived, only the sound of boots echoing off flagstone. “What’s that?” she asked.

“ _ That _ ,” Satan said, looking up before letting his gaze travel the circumference of the room, "is Mammon pacing up above. It seems the twins have finally reported your whereabouts.”

The crackle of light she’d been trying to trace disappeared, deadened as if the walls had become lead.

“I’m going to lift you up,” Satan said, and suddenly there was air against her skin and Satan was no longer at her eye level. 

Tensing and flexing against her bonds, nothing tightened but neither did it loosen. 

He hadn’t thrown her. Rationally, she knew that. 

There was no rigging, only the two of them. She was just  _ higher _ , floating there, a few inches above where she’d been before.

“I can make the bonds vanish the moment you say,” Satan said. It was a gentle reminder.

His expression told her they’d be gone in an instant if she found herself unable to speak. He wasn’t tense, but he was primed, alert, and in her periphery she could tell his arms were under her, around her, like her own cocoon. He would tear through it with his claws if she needed him.

“I’m okay,” she said, but it didn’t stop the shakes that had begun. A part of her wished Mammon was here with her, not stalking her from above. And yet, having him here would be too hard. There were too many walls between them now.

“It’s alright, you can let go,” Satan said.

Whether it was her will or his, she wasn’t sure, but she felt some of the gravity return. The bindings were warm and secure. It reminded her of the weird seaweed wraps that Asmodeus liked, tight but safe.

Tears leaked down her face. There should have been sobs. She expected them, so why weren’t they there? But that was the point, wasn’t it. She had no control, not here, not anywhere. She sucked in air greedily against a pressure in her chest that tried to keep it out.

“This will pass,” Satan said. He was so calm. How could he be so calm when the world was always falling apart? 

She believed him, but he was so much stronger: of course, of course a struggle like this would pass for him. What if, inside, she was stuck like this forever?

“Shall I recite a poem for you?” he asked.

She nodded quickly. Would a distraction help? Or would it just drag out the pattern of fear that she couldn’t seem to break? It didn’t really matter. If he wanted to, he could leave her tied up here, or read an entire poetry anthology until he was content, and she’d never break out on her own. It was up to him and she tried to relax into that knowledge.

“Not all girls are made of sugar and spice and all things nice.” he said, emphasizing each part with the rise and fall of his voice. “These are girls made of dark lace and witchcraft and a bit of vice.  _ These _ are daughters made claw first and story mad, tiger roar and wolf-bad.”

Air left her lungs in a breathy chuckle. 

“These are women made of terrible tempests and savage storms and the untamed unwanted.”

She couldn’t help but smile. Those were the women she wanted to be. She wanted to make her mother and her grandmother proud. More proud. 

“These are damsels made of flawless fearlessness made of more bravery than knights have ever seen.” 

The ropes didn’t press against her as tightly as they had before.

“These are princesses made of valour and poison alike and they are here to hold court as your queens.”

Flexing her fingers, her forearms laced together, she reached for him and gripped his shirt. She’d told him she was the dragon and here she was completely vulnerable before him instead. “Promise you won’t go anywhere?” she asked. It felt stupid. So stupid and weak. 

“Never,” he said, and her weight sunk more fully against him. He guided her head against his shoulder.

She’d given her word. ‘No hiding.’ Before opening her mouth, she knew her voice was thick with emotion. It would hurt to say. Would he laugh at her? He wouldn’t, but the fear of it still remained. 

“I’m afraid to be alone again.”

Satan’s hand settled against her temple and a weight dropped from her. She was bound up, as tightly as any of her responsibilities and fears could manage, but somehow, when it was just Satan and rope it made her feel free. “Were you afraid I was pretending to be your friend too?” she whispered.

For a moment, he stiffened around her. “Yes,” he said. “Very much so.”

Her tears had stopped. She sniffled and mumbled. “You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength." 

“Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, Marcus Aurelius” Satan said. “A very impressive man. You would’ve liked him. Not nearly as argumentative as Pythagoras.”

She groaned her laughter and pulled her face away from his shoulder. “Glad I missed out on that one. ‘Don’t eat in your chariot’ and ‘do not urinate against the sun’ are not the kinds of things I’d want to debate.”

His hand fell away from its place, sheltering her. “Oh, so you do know of him?” Satan asked. He sounded delighted.

“He sounds like he was a pain in the ass.”

“More than a few times I almost threw him like a javelin.”

Eyes still closed, she snorted her amusement. “I wouldn’t’ve had the patience.”

“Oh? I suppose you do usually leave the room when you’re upset…except when you decide to throw hands with The Devil.”

She still felt foggy, but she could tell he was thinking something beyond his teasing. The tapping of his fingertips across her shoulder told her so, but it seemed far away from her.

“You said you’re afraid to be alone again.” he said, letting it trail off like a question, “and you mentioned earlier that you have ‘nothing to go back to but monotony and loneliness.’”

The harness around her chest felt tighter again, bitingly so. ‘Be open.’ She breathed in. ‘No hiding.’ And breathed out. “I’m an adult orphan,” she said. “Nothing special.”

She’d considered trying to find her family to see if they’d been reincarnated yet, or if they were floating somewhere here or in the Celestial realm; but how would that help? How would any of it help? Would they recognize her? What if they were in torment? What if they’d been happy before being reminded she was apart from them? What if she led danger to them and they were the next pawns in this game? What if they were gobbled up for her selfish want of them?

She felt so fucking powerless. The only family she had here, Lilith, was the only family she didn’t want. “Even my cat kicked the bucket before I was dragged down here,” she said. It was a fact she gave up to him grudgingly and she dropped her head forward.

“And how does that make you feel,” he asked.

“Are you serious right now?” She rolled her head to the side, wishing the bindings ran higher up her arms so she could rest her temple against it. Looking away from him and into the nothingness of the room was tiring.

“Very,” he said.

“Why ask when you already know the answer?” It felt like the bindings were now what held her irritation down and kept it from reaching out to shake him. Was he trying to make her angry? She knew he wasn’t stupid.

“You know what they say about assuming.”

“Horrible!” she said, shouting into the room that was now swimming like dark watercolours around them. “It makes me feel horrible, and sad, and angry, and powerless...purposeless.”

“Show me.”

“What?” she asked, her voice registering high and sharp. He was staring at her expectantly. 

“Show me your anger.”

“I-I can’t just whip it out!” she said. He might as well have asked her to defecate next to him.

“Of course you can. I can feel it,” he said. “It’s always there.” He slid his hand to her middle, slipping his fingers under the intricate ropework to warm her solar plexus. “Right here.”

She glanced at Satan, down between the gap in her arm and her breast, to try and find the hand they hid, before looking anywhere but at him.

“If you don’t pay attention, I’m going to start playing pranks.”

Glaring, her eyes snapped back to him. Did he think this was easy? Funny?

“There it is,” he said with a smile, moving his hand so that the pressure of it circled minutely. “Just a little ember of what it was earlier.”

Was he just playing with her? She tried not to let the pain of that idea show on her face.

“Let’s sublimate that, shall we?” Carefully, he extricated his hand, and brought it up to her cheek. He wiped away new tears that she hadn’t noticed. “Let’s turn that into something useful if you can’t get rid of it, hmm?”

Marginally, she relaxed. He’d meant well, but the fear and the anger, from the possibility of his ridicule, still festered uncomfortably inside her. It was childish of her to hold on to it. She nodded, despite not knowing what he was asking of her. “I don’t want to be angry any more,” she said stubbornly.

“What makes you angry?” he asked, tilting his head to the side as if he were about to take up a pad and pen to document her mental case.

She’d come to him looking for something. She didn’t know what anymore. What had she hoped for? Solutions? Whatever it was she’d been looking for, it wasn’t this. “That’s not how it works” she said, each word bit out. It would be a shorter list to describe everything that didn’t bother her.   
  
“Of course it is,” he said, harshly. His voice matched the maelstrom that she realized had gradually begun to whip and roar around them.

Her eyes snapped to his immediately. They were bright against the muddy shadows that spun around the room.

“Emotions are not at odds with rationality,” he said firmly. 

He settled her to sit fully on the bed without his support and she heard how his hands gripped the frame of the bed, a brief squeal of distressed wood under pressure.

“Go on,” she said while trying to position herself to better see him. Oddly, his show of force near her didn’t alarm her. ‘Content next to the epitome of rage. How ironic.’

Kneeling at her side, he stroked his hand gently down her arm, caressing over each indent the rope made in her skin. “Emotions, at their core, are expressions of need.” 

She stared at him. His soft tone didn’t match the constantly flickering mass of rage reflected on the wall around them.

“For example, drunk dialing an ex:” he said with a rueful smile, “rationally, a terrible idea on the surface.” He looked to the vortex around them. “However the urge to call someone from our past for comfort is an impulse, a signal, that needs are not being met.”

Needs not being met, if that didn’t describe her, she didn’t know what would. The peek of sunlight down here had been a balm that she hadn’t realized she’d needed so desperately. What else was she missing that she’d pushed aside? “So, you’re saying emotions are an electrical impulse due to an upsetting event?” Her tone conveyed the flat despondency that was growing in her again. It pushed back against his ideas stubbornly.

“Yes, and no.” The world around them became sunlit once more, bright and warm with a flick of his wrist. “Emotions are like pain, they're calling our attention to a need, not just afflicting us needlessly based on external stimuli.”

“Then what is _ your _ need?” she asked. Her gaze skated over him, searching the fabric of his cozy sweater for answers.

Faint lines creased Satan’s forehead as he stopped to consider her question.

“Please tell me, my thoughtful warchild, that you’ve tried to apply this theory to yourself at least once.”

The sour pucker of his lips told her he hadn’t, but there was something else that caught her attention. Was it acceptance maybe? Recognition? It flickered so fast across his features she couldn’t be sure.

“We are not here for  _ me  _ today,” he said. “You don’t need to answer, so don’t feel the need to deflect either.” Carefully, he guided her back down onto her side on the bed, mindful of where her weight could shift while bound. The rope barely bit at all.

‘Right.’ That was probably the softest admonishment she’d ever received. They were supposed to be dropping their defenses in here.

He stepped away from the bed. “Reach out to me.”

“What?” she asked, alarmed. Was he asking the way Belphegor had before? ‘I’m bound. What else could he be asking for?’ she chastized herself. “I…”

Closing her eyes, she ground her face into the bedding. “It’s too tiring. I can’t do it again today.” Had they never heard of rest? Maybe the constant pace was what actually made this Hell.

“So you’ve already done it once today,” Satan said, clearly pleased by her admission. “Then now is the best time to reinforce that practice.”

She groaned and closed her eyes. This wasn’t potions class. Doing homework after taking notes wasn’t going to help here.

“It’s a particular theory of mine,” Satan said, suddenly looming over her, “that like female orgasms, witches are best induced to magic just as soon as they’ve finished the first round of chanting.”

Her eyes popped open in shock and she jolted at his voice so near. His certainty rang through louder than his teasing and it befuddled and aroused her in equal measure. Confusion and embarrassment tumbled into anger, only recognizing it and naming it for what it was when she caught herself straining against the bindings. 

“ _ Fine _ ,” she said. She knew her surliness was playing directly into whatever he was planning, but she couldn’t rein it in now even if she tried. Everything about this realm had her fed up and she wasn’t willing to play their pretty and sweet Disney Princess right now. If he wanted to pluck at her last nerve when she was immobile and helpless, then when she found him she’d make him dance like a fucking marionnette. 

She ignored the way the environment around them began to swirl again, focusing on Satan’s theatrical retreat and cocky bow. Once she proved her point and caught him, she’d march him out of here and do the second most embarrassing thing she could think of for him: have him accept penance over Mammon’s knee. They’d see who was smirking then.  _ Her _ hand wouldn’t sting him, but the humiliation of being spanked by Mammon would last millenia.

“I’ve trusted you with my pact, now trust me in turn,” he said.

For a moment she froze. He’d thrown her words in the hallway back at her. Was it meant as a test or reassurance? 

Her mind whispered to her of betrayal. What if he was goading her into relaxing all of her defenses just to take her over?

He’d sounded so shocked and sincere when he’d admitted he was afraid their friendship was all veneer. But wasn’t every lie made stronger by elements of truth? There was no way to know for sure if anything he said was truth.

Magic sublimated off Satan and into the cavern around them like mist. She eyed it warily, shaking in her binding with anger with anger and uncertainty.

It seemed as though his magic would be cold to the touch and, judging by his expression, flavoured with curiosity and amusement. Likely, it would hold more than a bit of expectation. Together with her trepidation, the concept of immersing herself in his magic was almost enough to cool her anger.

She took a deep breath, never breaking eye contact with him. Whether he was riling her or not, she’d come to him for a reason. If that meant showing him her hand, then so be it. 

This time, there was no searching; there was magic all around them, just as there had been in Beelzebub’s little fortress, but, here, all of it was still connected to Satan: a giant funnel web leading directly to him. It swirled and moved around them like an atmosphere and flowed in and out like steam as he breathed. 

“You who are born of shadow, hear me” she said, never taking her eyes off of him. “I call upon you!” She couldn’t see the change in magic around them, but it was like listening to Infernal speech: her mind latched on to patterns and zaps of movement, turning them into sensations and sound, touch and taste. Each roll of thunder around them had the faint feeling of memory.

The  _ click  _ she’d felt when commanding Asmodeus had been much weaker. This felt like she’d grabbed a tiger by the tail. There was no letting go. She shouted into the swirling chaos around them, “I call upon you to lend your power to Satan, Avatar of Wrath!”

The pulsing of the storm around them howled without words, but they bloomed in her body all the same. _ I don't wanna hurt 'em, but I did, I'm in a fit of rage / I'm murderin' again, nobody will evade _ . She watched in awe as each beat dragged Satan’s demonic form out, resplendent in acid greens and black.

Unflinching from Satan’s own steady gaze, she watched him stretch, flexing out his claws before him in wonder. The magic that licked around him sounded like death, like everything in her struggling to get out.  _ I'm fittin' to kill 'em and dumpin' their fuckin' bodies in the lake / Obliterating everything, incinerate a renegade. _

“So this is what Asmodeus meant,” he said. His tail slashed through the air, creating eddies and whorls in the angry darkness of the room. 

She could feel frustration curdling under her skin, her whole body a cursed pustule of anger. The way Satan reached out his hands placatingly did nothing. It was just an after image hidden by the beat that shook her vision.  _ 'Cause I'm beginnin' to feel like I'm mentally ill / I'm Attila, kill or be killed, I'm a killer bee / You're bringin' the killer within me outta me— _

She sagged in relief when Satan grabbed her. Any vindictive triumph she’d had was long gone, and all that was left was fatigue and grief. It felt like she was swaddled inside Satan’s storm, secure in the only safe port. 

Did he know his hair was like sunshine? It was bright despite the sad clouds inside them both. She could see the confusion on his face and the tense set of his shoulders as he worked to stabilize the suspension bridge she’d hastily lashed between them. It felt sturdier now, as if every lick of fire that passed between them made her stronger.

There was a warm, golden hum in her bones and she relaxed into it. Letting the fickle magic ebb and flow, she trusted Satan to keep her safe, and let the warmth lull her into a deep sleep.

Her bonds dissolved as she slipped into a state of repose, unaware of Satan’s alarm over the disappearance of his rope.

* * *

Slowly, Satan walked back to the surface with his mistress in his arms. How could one fragile human hold so much power? He’d tested her strengths before, but this was the first time she’d summoned him. There was no need to while surrounded by his power, but she’d chosen to, flexing her will over him.

And it had overwhelmed her.

He’d thought Asmodeus had been exaggerating, but no matter the vindictiveness or strength of retribution held within his previous summoners, nothing had compared to the magic with which she’d flooded him. Surely, it couldn’t have all come from her?

The hidden panel to the outside realm slid open without a word and Satan was met by the twins: Beelzebub pacing like a caged lion and Belphegor slumped against the wall of the building.

Immediately, Beelzebub was in front of him, arms outstretched like an eager toddler. “Ephemeris.”

Satan looked down at the jumble of knees and elbows bundled in his arms. She appeared so harmless, but now he knew that the storm in her was great enough to make an avatar, if only she had the power to do so. What her magic was, or how it hid itself inert inside her, he didn’t know, but Lucifer was lucky she couldn’t access it. 

Despite how close they’d been earlier, or perhaps because of the intimacy, it was difficult to give her over. “Don’t let her be alone for long,” Satan said. “Her sorrow is deep.” It was easy to recognize once he’d found it. It matched the kernel from which he’d been born.

With ease, Beelzebub took her. Only her hand fisted around his sweater collar kept them connected. 

Carefully, he uncurled her fingers. He’d done what he could and purged away most of the foreign energies, balanced her as best he knew how, but now he needed to return to his cell. He wasn’t fit to care for her for the remainder of the evening. “Keep her away from Oizys at the party tomorrow,” he said gruffly. 

The pink in his cheeks wouldn’t die away. He wanted to drag her back down into the breaking room and learn how she’d glided out of his knots as if they were made of melting butter. Instead, he told them what she’d want to know on waking. “There’s no removing it,” he said, “not without killing one of them.”

Belphegor struggled upright to check on her, drawing a finger down her arm and over the divots the rope had made. 

The accusing glare that accompanied the inspection didn’t phase Satan. “There’s no fine print, nothing else to the oath besides a promise of no harm without severe repercussions.” For a moment he paused and considered keeping the possibility to himself. No, they all needed to know what they were working with. He wasn’t going to hide things the way Lucifer did just to spare their feelings. “If she dies because of him, she’ll very likely take him with her.”

He turned, insensitive to the horror that was likely overcoming them, and he began walking back down his path, letting the darkness grow around him once more. 

‘The witch Maddie can’t even be counted her equal,’ he thought while he drew out his claws and let them scrape and trail over the corridor's stone walls. They were lucky their mistress wasn’t interested in inflicting pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The poem Satan recites is 'Difficult Damsels' by Nikita Gill
> 
> The musical reference is Eminem's 'Godzilla'
> 
> Oizys was the ancient Greek goddess of grief, anxiety, and depression. In fact, her Roman name “Miseria” is where the modern term “misery” comes from. She characterizes the spirit of the miserable human condition of deep sadness.


	116. Early Mornings Are The Best

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC doesn't wake up where she expects. At least she gets to go back to sleep before breakfast.
> 
> There is smut ahead. If you don't enjoy that content please skip to the bottom notes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for the beta reading and flexibility. I've been hard to get a hold of lately and they've been champs about it.

She was wrapped in warm arms, skin against skin, hands entwined. Still safe. The barest fluttering of consciousness pulled at her eyelids and she snuffled and turned her face away from the mop of unruly, white-tipped hair that tickled her nose.

Easily, she spread out her senses, like a heavy rug that kept rolling open without her direction: firm pressure against the back of her thighs, hot breath at the nap of her neck, no air stirred other than the even breathing around her. Satan wasn’t here: she couldn’t feel the hum of his energy. The heavy thud of two heart beats lulled her back to a sleep from which she’d never fully woken.

In what seemed like no time at all, the sensation of silk being draped over her made itself known. Somehow it was heavier than it should be. A sweet fragrance was in the room. ‘Wild roses?’ She blinked slowly and stretched, shifting a heavy arm from over her body as she did so.

“Asmo?” she asked, when she recognized the silky-smooth thigh between her own.

His soft mumbles were unintelligible, but it might’ve been the fact that she couldn’t match the words to his face, the face mask he wore hid most of his expression. Lifting the covers, she peeked beneath. Miracle of miracles: underpants. ‘Well, maybe not a miracle,’ she thought and inspected the bits of lace strung together to cover her own body. “Asmo,” she whispered again, “how did I get here?”

He sighed deeply, a heavy rumble that she wasn’t used to from him, and he pulled her closer. “Mmm. No talking, only cuddles.”

“That hand does not go there for cuddles, Mister,” she said, removing his hand from her ass and returning it to its place on her back instead.

“Mmph.” He shifted lower, off of his pillow, to press his face into her chest.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she said, squeaking the words out as her hands rose into the air uselessly. The paper portion of his face mask was now sitting sideways on his face as he smeared goo out from under the edges, all over her and the borrowed négligée. 

“Fuck heaven,” he mumbled into her cleavage.

She tried not to laugh at him, still able to call her on her slip up. “How did I get here and get undressed and dressed?” she whispered. Dressed was a generous word for it.

The sleepy grumbling he sent through her made her tingle in places that she didn’t want to wake up just yet.

“Twins dropped you off.” He made a noise that sounded suspiciously like he was trying to slurp back drool. “They had assignments, though it looked like Beel was just carrying Belphie.” Without further discussion, he wedged his thigh further between her knees, making himself at home like one of Satan’s self-assured strays.

This was actually a much better way to start the day than she’d been expecting. Asmodeus hadn’t even scolded her about his beauty sleep, just curled up around her. 

Carefully, she stretched her free arm up to the white headboard, finger-tipping her way over the upholstery to find the painted wood. There, she tapped softly and waited.

It took time, but eventually one of the Little Demons came to investigate. Which direction it had come from she wasn’t sure, but it scaled its way over the arch of the headboard and perched itself there to survey the lay of the land.

“Good morning,” she whispered. “Sorry to wake you.”

Little, red tipped horns above sleepy eyes, indicated it was likely one of Asmodeus’ ilk, but colour and shape couldn’t always be depended upon. “I didn’t want to wake your Lord,” she said.

It seemed to nod with its entire body.

“Would you mind passing me his D.D.D?” she asked, uncertainly.

The grousing squeaks it began to make as it turned its back to her was a solid no; however the stylized and swirling heart pattern pressed into its aether-skin in uneven pinks told her she still had a chance.

“I’m not going to spy, Little One,” she said softly. “Stay here and cuddle while I read the news...you can keep watch over my idle fingertips can’t you?”

A flutter of black wings told her she’d won before it had even turned back to her.

It hopped down, and scuttled out of her view before returning with a thoroughly bedazzled D.D.D. in its claws.

“Perfect,” she said as it approached.

Slowing as it got closer, it looked between her and Asmodeus, and she suddenly understood its apprehension: A house cat asked to cuddle between the paws of a tiger.

“He won’t get upset if I invited you,” she said, and beckoned it closer. “Besides, if Asmodeus allows you in his private rooms, he must trust you. If you’re allowed in while I’m here, then you must nearly be his right hand.” Her demons might epitomize a  _ single _ sin each, but that didn’t mean all of them weren’t susceptible to flatteries. Their vanity made them all too human.

If Little Ds could blush, she was sure this one would be red from toes to horn tips. It scrambled over the bedding and to her side.

“Come keep my neck warm,” she said.

Rows of bright white points were brandished at her when the Little Demon’s jaw fell the length of its body. Now it knew that she had extended her trust fully, bare neck and all, and it dropped the D.D.D., attempting to catch it before it clattered down to the floor. It seemed the ability to phase one's body in and out of existence didn’t lend itself to graceful coordination.

Carefully, once it was clear Asmodeus wasn’t going to stir, the Little Demon circled over her pillowed head to place the D.D.D in her hand before making its way back to her nape. It poured itself over her neck and decolletage like warm fog, cozy like the foam from the tops of cappuccinos. The purr of curiosity it gave reminded her of Satan’s coffee art in the strangest way. Maybe Beelzebub’s world view was rubbing off on her.

How long ago had it been since she’d been captured at The Fall? Had the tabloids forgotten yet? Guessing at Asmodeus’ password wasn’t difficult and she was in without issue. It was keeping from bumping Asmodeus while she scrolled the gossip columns that was difficult. Mention of her was minimal, all of it contradictory to one another. “Lucifer’s Resolute Roar” took up the front page of every subscription: nothing but trite propaganda and simpering letters from minor nobles and divas as far as the eye could see. No Doyen worth their salt would unseal their lips for any of it, not unless they were certain of their own social safety. No grains of truth to be scavenged there today.

“Publedina,” she whispered to the air. She had to repeat the call a few times before the mal'akh arrived. It dipped and swayed with its arms full of message cards and a thick pen in its mouth. “Brilliant creature.”

The wombat spirit was not as thoughtful when it dropped its burdens on the pillow directly above Asmodeus’ head.

With a bit of work, and finagling around Asmodeus’ sensitive form, and a growing army of Little Demons who had decided that the human was fair game for a cuddle puddle, she was able to get a written message out to Solomon. Choosing how to assure him of her survival had been the real difficulty. “Relatively unscathed” had been a key description. She was sure that Asmodeus would have told him, but he deserved to hear from her after the dying wishes she’d hurled at him without warning.

Dread began to fill her belly. She wasn’t sure yet how to face Leviathan, or any of them really. ‘Sorry I tried for death by Lucifer,’ didn’t seem like the most comfortable conversation starter. Had he already heard her voicemail?

Within minutes of Publedina’s departure, Asmodeus’ D.D.D. lit up. She didn’t answer Solomon’s call but she did send a photo of herself looking no worse for the wear, with Asmodeus covering her modesty with his face.

Three little dots danced across the screen before going dead again. He was likely saving the photo. Knowing Solomon, he’d use it to get out of the next “must be seen at” function Asmodeus tried to drag him to. She gave him another couple of minutes before she deleted the image from the chat and from the D.D.D. No need for Asmodeus to be cranky with her about an imperfect photo of him, not yet anyway. It was too early for that. 

Resisting the urge to peek at other chats and DMs, instead she opened a browser to the Devilnet once more and made her way through less frivolous publications. What had she missed since The Fall? She was so out of touch after only a week. Diavolo’s Valentine’s Day party was in the headlines but it seemed to have morphed into something grander. His parties often morphed into unexpectedly large soirées, yet this was still more. Names and titles were dropped like rain in every column. Even if the translator function wasn’t perfect, it was clear this had become more of a diplomatic event than the small gathering she’d hoped for. 

It was like her first few weeks all over again. She stewed in her irritation. The pleasantries she’d need to feign were never her strong suit. At least this time she had more experience under her belt. She tapped her thumbs against the D.D.D. screen and took comfort in the heavy, black fog that blanketed her and purred against her throat. Their eyes and teeth that peeked out didn’t startle her as much as they used to. 

‘Not as much as it used to,’ she thought, pausing over a picture of Lucifer at the last gala. He looked especially severe as a gelatinous diplomat was bent over his gloved hand in obeissance. Her jaw clenched and she struggled against the unexpected burn of tension. Too quickly it gave way to the sinking in the pit of her stomach. How was any human supposed to go up against devils? Few were as intimidating or able as Lucifer, but they were many. 

She just needed more research time. Something would come to her. The Devildom was a no-win scenario for a human, even a human with archdemons, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t find the least-losing approach. 

About to lower the D.D.D. and sink into sleep’s forgetful grasp, she froze. There was no bandage on her hand. Transferring the D.D.D. to one hand, she stared at the empty one, searching for a scar or a hint of what had transpired. It was unblemished. Likely too “dry” for Asmodeus’ liking but it was whole and no longer stained in blood.

Trepidation sang under her skin as she closed her eyes. She’d reached out to her demons with wildly varying success rates, but she’d never tried to look inside herself. It felt off. Instead of the usual layers of magic to sift through or the emptiness it was like nudging at a Christmas cake, hoping for the coin to pop out. Her breathing was disrupted as she swallowed thickly a few times and it only threw her off further. She could sort of feel something, but it didn’t seem like what she was looking for. If Lucifer left his magic behind within her, was it really a breach of privacy to try and touch it? The purring around her disappeared as she held her breath to focus.

“Dearest,” Asmodeus said, his voice somehow curling hot and low inside her, sliding his presence out of the intangible shadows where she’d been attempting to look, “You don’t need to reach. I told you before that all you have to say is that you want me.” He was in her head.

Dragging at the tendrils of magic that sparked and shone around her, she clutched Asmodeus against her body. It was too much. She was drowning in a sudden flood of want but it did nothing to quench her growing thirst.

“There, there,” Asmodeus crooned into her neck, his chin resting on her sternum.

She gave a choked out cry before she could swallow it down, too lost to tell whether he was trying to soothe or encourage her.

The warmth around her physical body disappeared, replaced by soft muttering and the brush of fabric over her chest. It slid smoothly over the face mask cream a few times and then daubed over her until she could feel the grit of the lace that barely covered her.

“Asmo…” she said, shakily and forced her eyes open.

His charming powers didn’t affect her, but the grin and low-lidded eyes he fixed her in place with did.

He’d scrubbed away the last of his face mask on the sheets, leaving him pinked. “Good morning,” he said before leaning forward to capture her lips, pressing her back into the pillows so that he hovered partially over her.

Slowly, she undented her fingertips from his back, steadying herself, and brought her hands up to cup his face. When he gave her a chance, she said, with a breathless laugh, “I-I don’t think the twins left me here for you to ravish.”

The only answer he gave her was another kiss, deeper and more demanding, while his fingers flitted over her négligée, nudging her body with a hundred little touches until she rolled her hips and arched up against him.

“Too fast,” she said, the words barely able to escape her as a whimper. Asmodeus could make her feel amazing but she couldn’t think; they’d gone from neutral to overdrive in the span of a few heartbeats.

He sighed next to her ear, a pouty noise following it from low in his throat. “I can’t hear you, you have too many clothes on,” he said.

This time she laughed properly. “And who’s to blame for that?” she asked, teasing him in turn. He’d made the right choice though, barely covered was still covered, and she would’ve been upset to wake up naked in someone else’s bed. “Although, I don’t see why you’re complaining. You had me wearing more of your face cream than actual bed clothes.”

About to counter her claims, she leaned up and kissed him before he could start. The groan he gave her made her want to curl her toes and tighten her thighs around him. Such a delicate noise but so full of want. She’d surprised him.

“I couldn’t help but notice,” he said, pulling away, “that I would like to have sex with you on a regular basis.”

“Is that so?” She raised an eyebrow with a teasing smile. This wasn’t the first time he’d pitched that plan, but today was the first time there were so few roadblocks between her and saying yes.

“Mmm, absolutely.” He stroked his thumb over her kiss-swollen lips. “You manage to keep yourself in check so well. Why not let go again? I’ll remind you why Asmo is the best!"

She hadn’t even realized she was moving. His thumb had left her lips and stroked down along her ribs, dancing his fingers over her body with a nonchalance that didn’t match the intensity of his stare. Everywhere he touched her body rose to meet him. 'Just a little more pressure. What’s just a little more? That will be enough to be content, won’t it?'

This wasn’t the Asmodeus she’d experienced last time, half-mad and touch starved; this morning, he was composed and methodical, using his breath, and voice, and touch to play her like a living instrument. It would be so easy to slip under the spell of his reassurances. The burning he so easily built up in her would distract her in no time. Why had she hesitated?

The D.D.D., discarded next to her lit up with a picture of the student council: the house chat. “It’ll start a fight,” she said and squeezed her eyes closed, turning her face away from him and the screen for good measure.

He tutted at her before bringing his mouth down around her nipple, the lace in the way ignored as he sucked, and flicked his tongue over the material. Her shocked squeal seemed to give him pause and he moved slower, pulling her to him with a hand on either side of her ribcage.

Releasing her nipple, he moved over to the other, hovering above his target to speak and draw out her anticipation. “If it starts a fight then they’re not mature enough to handle you. Give yourself to me.”

Her heart was a pounding drum. It was embarrassing how easily he made her jerk and writhe under him. She wanted to hide away from the raw reactions he garnered from her but she couldn’t, not without breaking contact. Pulling away would wound him. “Shouldn’t we maybe-maybe talk...Oh fuck, Asmo.” His hold on her had shifted to the underside of her thigh, dragging her leg up along his hip so that he grazed her core with his body. She was already so wet.

“Have you never had more than one paramour?” he asked, his voice a mixture of mocking and kind. He descended on her other breast, lavishing it with all the attention his mouth could provide.

"Of course nOT!” she said. She spread her arms out wide until her palms brushed against the mattress, trying to ground herself even as she arched her back to meet him. The bed, now devoid of Little Demons, she wasn’t worried about digging her nails into the bedsheets. Her next words were a whisper. “I've never felt like this before.” He pulled away and the cold air felt like a punishment. 

“Desperate for my touch or wanting after many?” he asked teasingly while lowering her back to the mattress, soothing her trembling with a gentle slide of his palm between her breasts and down her belly.

“Both,” she said, relaxing into the slow rhythm of his hand. The tension in her shoulders receded and her breathing began to even out. This was what she wanted, the steady dance between comfort and sensation. “I want too much.”

He laughed, and pecked her lips with amusement in his eyes, her inner thigh never allowed to leave his hip. “Never too much!”

In an instant, he’d reversed their positions and he lay beneath her. 

“You should want it all,” he said. The corners of his eyes had grown tense. It was gone again in an instant. “You're my Mistress and, so long as you’ll allow it, I'm going to do all sorts of filthy things to you because you belong to me as much as I am your tool.”   
  
“Asmo!” Her entire face was red and no longer only from physical sensation. He was so sweet and so sly. Trust him to find a way to word a claim of ownership in a way she’d melt for. “Tell me what you want,” she said, barely breathing the question out.

He licked his lips and gripped her hips to grind her over his lower stomach in answer. “I'm going to fuck you as often as I can and in as many ways as my filthy mind can come up with.”

Excitement buzzed through her body. The brief tug of her hips had shot electricity through the rest of her. She froze when he grabbed her hand and hauled her down, flat against his chest, where she strained to hear every syllable he growled against her. 

“That's what makes a strong pact.” 

The sound rippled out of him and she felt his craving for her closeness like a lead blanket. There was no leaving him. He’d laid his need bare. She tried to keep her nails from digging into his skin. His desperation was contagious. It wasn’t just lust she felt and so she pulled herself up, using his shoulders, until she could seal her mouth against his.

The sigh of contentment he breathed out his nose was all she needed to hear. It wasn't a groan of lust but he still held her to him as tightly as if it were.

"I don't want to be selfish," she said, dropping her head and mumbled it against his collarbone while she panted for breath. "How do I keep everyone happy?" His fingers carded through her tangled hair distracting her. Was he thinking? 

"Perhaps not unhappy..." he said softly, likely more to himself than to her. He was exceptionally intuitive about managing others when he wasn't focused on himself. If anyone could find a way it would be him.

Before, she'd been a lit match in the dark, but, since Asmodeus had stirred her body, she'd let her need for love and carnal affection turn into a wildfire. "I've never wanted so many people at once or for so many different reasons," she said while resting her cheek against him. It felt like she was in a constant state of motion despite their stillness; his breathing made her twitch, and she braced her forehead against his shoulder. "You've made me unable to love small."

Where he'd seemed content before to let her set their pace, now she found herself reclined against his raised knees. The fabric between her back and his thighs was nowhere near as soft as his skin. Asmodeus breathed in sharply and surged forward. "You say the sweetest things, Dearest." 

The quick motion brought into focus that he’d moved them. The bed-drapes were no longer behind her but at her side. She trusted him when his knees dropped away and wasn’t disappointed when his arms wrapped round to support her. Why did the press of another body against her feel so freeing? The Avatar of Lust was seducing her and yet she felt an immaculate excitement bubbling to the surface, eager to expand outside her chest and wrap its own arms around her lover: layers of companionship and infatuation finally free to mingle with pleasure.

"We'll find a way," Asmodeus said and trailed rapid kisses down her throat and chest. They were fierce and distracted touches of his lips, reminiscent of their last tryst. His hands skated over her sides and down her legs. 

She didn't know when her legs had wrapped around him, but there was nothing that felt more right: an anchorage for her as his hands made her body erupt with heat. The throbbing of his cock between them was stronger than she expected and she briefly wondered if he was purposefully flexing. Her hands found their way into his hair, holding him in place for more of his inebriating kisses. This time she wasn’t going to run away. 

The slide of their skin against one another was a contrast of friction and glide: the bunching of lace and damp cotton against skin, a demanding grip of thigh and shoulder, moving so quickly between softness and harsh want that it was disorienting. It took her a moment to recognize the growing tightness in her belly; she was too focused on the way Asmodeus' hands appeared and disappeared from around her breasts. Caressing and lifting, occasionally tweaking her nipples through the fabric when there was enough space between them, he made her jump just enough for her to give him back the ability to let his mouth roam.

"What do you want?" she managed to ask. Was he looking for a one off whenever he felt handsy? It had sounded before like he wanted more, something less superficial, but she needed to be sure. So often they laughed it off as nothing more than flirty nature.

He wrenched the front of her négligée down, and immediately latched onto a nipple, his lips moving in unrelenting worship and she rocked mindlessly against him.

A lance of electricity shot through her, connecting her nipple to her clitoris, encouraging her body to double over, barely keeping her in his lap. The pulse of pleasure inside her increased as Asmodeus' hand rolled the nipple of her other breast, kneading in time with his mouth. Without thought, her body bowed back, intent on bringing her closer to the source of her want as her hips stuttered over him. She could feel the slick mess she'd made between them and wished he were inside her.

"I've never…" she started to say. There was so much intensity from so little. Everything was foggy and warm but urgent. She wanted his kiss back but couldn't think how to make the words. She was out of breath. She'd been whispering his name over and over, a quiet applause for his ego. "This is!—"

He dragged his tongue in wide circles, dampening as much of her breast as he could without lifting his mouth off of her. When he did lift away, the cold air was once again a stark contrast from his mouth and only the tender draw of his nails and fingerpads, back and forth, along the underside of her breast kept her from pulling him back to her.

Breastplay had never been enough to get her off before, but the heat of his mouth as it moved to her other breast brought her to the edge. Each movement of his tongue, the gentle rocking of his hips under her, and the cold he'd left behind him, it took the last of her breath away and she shook, nearly crying from the overload of sensation.

Soothing strokes down her arms brought her back to herself. She was flopped forward, face tucked between Asmodeus' neck and shoulder, with her arms still awkwardly crisscrossed at the back of his skull.

"I want to know that our bond is so deep that we can enjoy the flesh of others without jealousy," he whispered while she continued to gasp, barely able to hear him. "I want to come back to you as often as you'll have me so that I can keep showing you the depth of our bond.” 

She felt his kiss atop her head and wiggled upright to pull him into a kiss. The friction she created made them both groan and was quickly silenced so that she could pour all of her feelings into their kiss. She wasn't yet capable of eloquent speech needed for that but he had to know that she cherished him. “Tell me what you want,” she said again.

The steady jumping of his cock between them answered her question as much as the pink glow that lined his eyelashes. She rocked her hips over him again and watched his eyelids flutter. There was no need to deny themselves.

She convinced her legs to let her rise, just enough that she could reach between them and pump his cock in her grasp. Without further delay, she angled her body to take him, intent on sliding her sensitive cunt down around him slowly.

"Sorry," Asmodeus said, his apology more air than sound as he thrust up into her.

Her body quaked and bucked at the sudden intrusion. "Fuck." Fingers trembling and eyes closed, she was overwhelmed by the aftershocks he created.

"Sorry to skip to the main event but I've wanted to feel you around me for so long," he said and lifted her hips to guide her movements to match the rhythm of her panting. "I want to take you just to the edge of madness with pleasure."

Her hands were everywhere, trying to find something to hold onto at the edge of the bed. The ebb and flow of tension inside her was beautiful, a constant flow of pleasure coursing up into her. There was no need for sorry when they felt like this together.

"This is our first time, on purpose...I should have planned something nicer," he said, slowing their movements to a near standstill.

She gave a noise of disapproval, half whine and half groan. It ebbed away into nothing when he wrapped his arms around her. The sudden shift from fervor to tenderness threw her off as she felt a soft hand at the back of her neck and his other arm clasping her tightly to him. His soft sigh cleared her mind enough to look at him properly.

Where the pistoning force beneath her had disappeared, it was replaced now by slow grinding movements. With just enough space to look at his upturned face, she saw the softness of his expression.

“I...I don’t want you to think this is all I am.” He gasped prettily when his words made her inner walls contract around his cock.

“You’re the Avatar of Lust,” she started to say. His brows pressed together in pain and she cupped his cheeks in her hands. "But that’s not all you are, Asmo, I'd never think that." Slowly, she leaned down to kiss him. It was soft and chaste despite the fact that he was inside her. "I know you have a filthy mind, but you're a hopeless romantic with a filthy mind."

Dropping his head to her shoulder, he whispered, "You can't know that. I'm a demon. I could be deceiving you." 

"A lover’s lies are just as likely in a human as a demon,” she said and rearranged his hair so that it didn’t block her meager view of him. “And I know I can trust you.”

A rosy blush painted his cheek, a darker than the rise of passion he’d had before.

“How can you ever truly know?” he asked, his voice small, pleading. 

She could see the weight dragging down his shoulders, felt it in the way even his hands, still on her skin, seemed to slack themselves to gravity’s call. “I know,” she said, “because you'll be mine in the middle of the night." She kissed the space between the tip of his ear and his temple. "Or in the afternoon." Sliding her hands down his neck, she gently put space between them so that she could rest her forehead against his. “I know that you’ll be mine in the early mornings, with only the second moon for light.” Playfully, she pulled back to rub her nose against his. "And I know that you'll kiss everything better or worse."

"Worse?" he asked, a hint of hurt pursing his lips.

Roughly threading her fingers into his hair, she kissed him with all of the want she’d been holding back. Even with her eyes closed she could see the brightness of his power spilling out of its confines to illuminate the room. Her hips moved of their own accord as she promised him between broken kisses, "No matter how much you can turn me on, it's that you treat me like I'm precious to you that matters.”

His hiccoughed ‘thank you’ was lost to her with the shock of suddenly rising and falling in his lap, her own exclamation drowning him out.

“Tell me what you want, Asmo,” she asked, stunned and quivering in his lap.

“Honesty, hope, passion,” he said, each word punctuated by a guided thrust. “The glory of you around me.”

He was the Avatar of Lust but it was the sincerity of his words that were undoing her. There was no proper rhythm she could follow, each proclamation brought with it a different angle and speed. She tried to seal his mouth again with her own and derail him for a moment, but he shied away, leaving her vulnerable to his answers.

“Happiness,” he said, groaning the word out against her throat. “Sincerity. Respect.” For a moment he seemed to lose himself and clung to her, grinding her clit against his pubic bone. Only the sound of her high pitched whine and attempts to move broke the haze from his eyes. 

She’d been expecting him to choose a favourite position, not flood her brain with sweetness and devotion. Every time he spoke she could feel her body try and hold him inside her just a little longer. The reprieve from earlier should have cooled her down, but, already, she felt the beginnings of another orgasm.

“Why don't you tell me what you want, my dearest Asmo?” she asked, barely holding on for the ride. The tingling in her arms and legs told her she was almost at the point of no return.

A broken sob froze her around him, but it didn’t stop their movement together. Was he crying? Had echoing his endearment back to him changed things?

“Love,” he said, growling the pleading word so that it echoed through the room. “Love and your partnership. Eternity. I want it all. I swear them all to you.”

She melted back into his embrace, finally silencing him with a kiss as she tried to take him over the edge with her, her ankles crossed at the small of his back. Her sweet, sweet Asmodeus. Mind going blank she took the peak of her orgasm from his offerings, and promised herself that she would cuddle and reassure him mercilessly after.

Breathing heavily, Asmodeus continued their slow motions, each little wave of pleasure smaller than the last until she could finally make words again. She took in the sheen of sweat and the way his hair stuck to his forehead in places.

His eyes shone with wonder before he noticed her gaze and he quickly looked over her shoulder.

“Are you okay?” she asked in a hushed voice.

There was no answer, only the tightening of his hold on her and his chin being jutted more pronouncedly over her shoulder.

“Asmo?” she asked. Had she done something wrong? Had she pushed him too far? She petted his hair and felt him shiver. Maybe he hadn’t been ready to step outside of his shell of beauty and lust. “ **Tell me what you need** , Asmo.”

She hadn’t meant to invoke their pact, but she felt the click of magical connection jolt them both.

“I need you,” he said, his voice dark and deeper than his usual affectation. His hands moved lower and grabbed her behind harshly. “I need to see your ass at a better angle than this mirror allows.” Unceremoniously, he lifted her off of him and tossed her back up onto the center of the bed.

An unexpected feeling of coldness gripped her. He was so far away now. Had she been wrong? Had he been giving her a last out before he played with her and then was done, off to find a new prospect?

“This,  _ this _ is what I want,” he said, dragging her up onto her hands and knees where he nipped at one of her round cheeks. 

His continued touch brought her more comfort than was right. ‘Please let me be right.’ It felt dangerous to allow herself the delusion, but she waited, craving a return to their closeness more than she feared his potential dismissal. 

“I’m going to fill you up so well.” His warm hands travelled up her sides.

He’d come already, she knew that, the evidence of it was already sliding down her thighs. He couldn’t possibly be ready to go again. She felt the press of his lips as they circled around his target, inching closer and closer to her exposed labia. 

The adventurous tongue she’d expected didn’t arrive at its destination, instead she felt the head of his cock slide beneath her clitoris and back to tease slowly against her labia again. ‘How is he still hard?’ The buzzing in her body told her to ignore reason and take what she was offered. 

Pressing backward without success, she found his fist surrounding the head of his cock, stopping her progress. “A-Asmo…” she groaned. She needed more than just the tip. “Don’t tease.” Over sensitized, she bucked as he repeated the pattern. She tried again, “Tell me what you need.”

A quick slap to her ass startled her into stillness, all the better to hear his answer as he pressed back inside her.

“Mmm, just like that. This is what I need.” Confidence filled his every word. “Going to make you so round and thick. He leaned himself over her back.

Steadily, his weight settled over her, trapping her in place so that his hands could roam, searching for new holds to pull himself deeper. Her knees slid out to the side to keep herself upright, and Asmodeus surged into her again and again, words of adoration falling from his mouth. 

“Beautiful. So perfect,” he said as he cupped her breasts and felt them bounce. “Gonna watch you grow.”

His words didn’t make sense, but she wasn’t sure she cared as long as he continued. “More,” she said. “Please don’t stop.”

“It’s not over yet. Not until I’ve filled you,” he said. He wrapped an arm under her hips to keep her in place. “I’m gonna make you heavy with my seed.”

She shivered. Being pregnant wasn’t something she wanted, nor something even possible due to Almathea’s brews, but it didn’t make her knees any less weak to the want in Asmodeus’ voice. A terrible heat burned in her, driving and demanding she push back onto him and take him for all he was worth. “Please,” she said again, willing to play along.

“That’s it,” he said. “I’m gonna give you as many sweet little cherubs as you want.” 

“Oh fuck, right there! Asmo, please!” she said. There was a spot inside her absolutely singing his praises, sending pleasure up her spine. She lifted a hand off the bed, confident Asmodeus would keep her upright, or at the very least wouldn’t stop if they fell. Circling her clit with her fingertips, she alternated between touching herself and gripping Asmodeus where he didn’t fully enter her.

He groaned loudly in her ear.

“You like that?” she asked. “You like when I touch where we’re joined.” She felt his hips stutter. “Give it to me. Keep my pussy dripping with your come.”

“Can’t let you drip,” he panted. “Gonna keep it all inside you.”

The arm around her waist disappeared, and she felt his hand spreading her labia so that her own finger slid against her partially unhooded clitoris. She squealed at the change and wiggled as he angled himself even deeper. It felt like she couldn’t breath, each stroke was stealing the air from her lungs.

“Just like that,” he said. “Keep touching yourself while I spread you.” His voice cracked, he sounded desperate, the words almost shouted.

The idea of an imaginary baby, as sweet and beautiful as Asmodeus, filled her mind. It wouldn’t happen, but it still sent a rush of warmth through her. “Breed me,” she said.

He lost his rhythm completely.

“Breed me,” she said again, just as he pulled her upright against his chest. “I want it.” Every breath he took she felt. Her entire body jolted as he sunk into her one more time, his testicles flush against her ass. She was sure he was done, but then he pinched her clitoris, something she’d never before found helpful. Her third orgasm took her by surprise, milking him for everything he was worth.

When they collapsed back onto the bed he didn’t let her go, cuddling close and holding her sweaty body to his. They lay there for a while just breathing, until finally she decided to break the quiet. “So,” she said with a smile he couldn’t see. “I know lots of people have a daddy kink, but I wasn’t expecting a  _ daddy  _ kink.”

Asmodeus huffed into her hair and flicked her hip. They both settled back into sleep, content to talk about it another time.

* * *

“Ugh,” she grunted, tossing Asmodeus’ D.D.D. back onto the bed in favour of getting dressed. “I hate reading the tabloids here.” Politics and gossip were a good enough buffer for them to continue enjoying one another’s company without delving into where they stood. She could tell that even Asmodeus needed some time to digest.

“You only say that because you’re in them, Dearest.”

“If they’d at least pick an angle, I could get used to it.” She snatched up the device again and the screen lit up under her fingertips. “I mean look at this! This one here with the specist slant: I’m the poor human whose existence is cursed because I’ll quickly die by the claws of my betters.” 

Scrolling only half an inch she pointed to another. “The blog for Equal Existence isn’t any better, spouting that it’s not fair that I’m so weak and that I should be cocooned for my own safety. They agree in one breath, despite one loathing me and the other wanting to keep me like a pet, and in the next breath apparently I’m a menace that will bring about the downfall of demon society with my dangerous ideas. Or or or,” she said, finding another contradictory piece, “I should be celebrated because I’m a breath of fresh air necessary for demon society to continue.” 

“Are you worried about your image, Dearest?”

She grumbled and tensed one side of her mouth, undecided. “No? Yes? I don’t know. I’m just tired of everyone talking out of their asses.”

“Are you going to stay grumpy all morning?”

It was impossible to be grumpy  _ all _ morning given their earlier endeavours but she still puffed out her cheeks in annoyance. 

Asmodeus brought her arms up around his neck and proceeded to spin them both around in a circle.

When her feet touched the floor, there wasn’t a trace of her frown left, instead her broad smile shifted into something pensive and her focus drifted away. “No,” she said, snapping her gaze up to Asmodeus. It seemed all she’d needed for now was a good vent, a good rest, and a good fuck. “I’m going to have to show them how it's done.” 

“Ooooh, well you have me intrigued.” 

She could tell he wasn’t entirely convinced, but first thing was first: Breakfast. There would be enough time this week to flesh out a further plan of action. If she played her cards right she might even be able to drag the others into her scheme, however backward that would seem. Maybe this wouldn’t be the same as her first weeks after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who skipped this chapter because of smut, it's safe to read after the horizontal line.
> 
> Summary:
> 
> MC feels warm and cozy in the twin's room but somehow wakes up in Asmo's bedroom. She's not sure how she got there or into the risque outfit she's in. Both she and Asmo are clothed though and she feels less unsettled.
> 
> With the the help of Publedina and a cuddly Little D, MC sends a reassurance note to Solomon and is able to unlock Asmo's phone to browse the news. Asmo is sleepy and gets his facemask all over her during cuddles. Other Little D's join the purr-y cuddle puddle.
> 
> MC notices that her oath injury is gone and tries to focus on it the way she did when attempting to find Satan and Belphegor. Asmo wakes up instead. There is an exchange of ideas during naughtiness. MC is worried about an argument ensuing if she dallies with Asmo again. Asmo believes that the others aren't mature enough to be with her if they're going to argue.
> 
> Before they get to to the main event, Asmo admits that he's worried MC will never fully trust him, because he's a demon, and that she might only see him as the Avatar of Lust. MC gives reassurances. Sexy time.  
> After, Asmo seems off, and MC accidentally commands him to tell her with it is he actually needs.  
> More smut ensues. Asmo has a "breeding" kink. While MC is on a contraceptive this won't affect anything, but its clear that what he wants most is a few little cherubs flying around.
> 
> While cuddled up, after lazy banter, they fall back asleep. When they wake up, they try to keep things as normal as possible. MC decides that if everyone is going to write about her, then she's going to take control of the narrative of her story. Onward to breakfast!


	117. Danish Pastries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC has been trying her best to start her day off right and she's going to keep it that way no matter what breakfast throws at her...once she can convince herself to get down the stairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone for you patience with this chapter. I've been quite unwell and am very excited to get back to writing.
> 
> Massive thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their constant encouragement and beta reading.

Brilliantly confident before, she hesitated now, foot hovering over the first step down the stairs. Her eyes were wide before her face started to crumple inward with worry. “Today’s Levi’s turn to make breakfast,” she said. 

“Oh, that,” Asmodeus said casually, stepping ahead of her to take her hand and coax her down the first step. “We already talked to him. You’ll be fine.”

Asmodeus sounded certain and she let herself be led over the precipice. The drop down to the first step was more jarring than it had any right to be. She was a strong, independent woman...who’s best friend probably thought she’d abandoned him. Would he even look at her? Knowing him, he’d flee the table the moment she arrived.

“Dearest, you’ve got to trust me. It’ll be fiiiiine.”

She didn’t have to say anything more, her wrinkled brow and uncertain pout gave her thoughts away. Body angled away from Asmodeus, she looked ready to retreat. 

“Levi might be a little  _ skittish _ this morning but he still wants to be your ‘Player One,’” Asmodeus said, rolling his eyes at the title.

His little smirk at the name didn’t go unnoticed, but she ignored it. He was always looking for an innuendo of some variety, and he’d imply one if he couldn’t find it. “What’d you tell him?” she asked. She fidgeted with her free hand, all thoughts of steamrolling the media banished. ‘Did he hear the message I left?’ 

“Come here,” Asmodeus said, but stepped up closer to her instead, and placed his hands on her hips. “Levi will be happy to see you.” He bumped his forehead lightly against hers. “I promise.”

Bit by bit her shoulders inched downward to something close to relaxed. “Okay,” she said, looking away to blow the air out of her lungs and give herself a shake. 

Slowly, hand in hand, they made their way down to the dining room, once again avoiding her bedroom.

“You’re going to have to let me back into my room sometime,” she said and stuck the tip of her tongue out at Asmodeus.

“Careful, now,” he said with a squeeze of her hand in his, ready to step over the threshold. “You’ll end up missing breakfast if you entice me like that.”

She came to a dead stop and watched his brief flicker of confusion while he turned to her, their hands still clasped. With an alacrity that surprised even her, she was in Asmodeus’ personal space, pressing her body against him and sandwiching him between the doorframe. “Isn’t that my line?”

Before he could answer, she pulled him into a kiss. The room felt ten degrees warmer, as if she were sliding headfirst under a heated blanket rather than impishly sneaking her fingers between the buttons of his shirt to rake over his skin. Was he altering the temperature around them, or did she just get this hot for him?

A strangled “ACK!” and the clatter of plates broke her concentration.

Her head was foggy as she tried to pull away to get a better idea of the noise that had disturbed them. As she turned, Asmodeus’ was quick to pull her back against him. She rose on her tiptoes to try and feel more of him against her, but he covered her eyes and held her still.

“Breeeaathe,” Asmodeus said, to her. He coached several breaths until she did as he asked. “Levi, put your frills away! No one wants to see that in the morning.”

“Me? You’re the one making out in the dining room! And they’re gills!”

“Just—” Asmodeus said, leaning away from her hands as they attempted to find their way into his hair. He didn’t sound sulky, mostly concerned. “Just come here and put your finger on her skin, Levi. We need to fix this before anyone else comes down for breakfast.”

She pouted and dropped down from her tiptoes in a huff. Why were they being so noisy? Everything would be perfect and warm if she could just get a little closer, touch just a little more and hear Asmodeus moan for her. 

“Dearest, you know I would ravish you in a second, but you’re upset.” He spun her around, careful to keep her in place with an arm around her ribcage and a hand over her eyes like a falconer’s hood.

Being unable to see made the delicious feel of him more tempting. “Not upset,” she said and bit her lip. “Just let me touch you.” She heard Asmodeus groan in frustration and she blinked, fluttering her lashes against his palm. 

“There, stay just like that for a minute,” Asmodeus said.

The cold that slowly crept over her eyes and her side felt damp; no, it was heat being leeched from her, and she tried to lean away. Hadn’t she just heard Leviathan? They’d been on their way to breakfast. 

“Put your palm flat, Levi. If you just poke her with a finger we’re going to be here all day.”

The buzzing under her skin made her thoughts drift out of focus, but they were quickly pulled back. “What are you doing?” she asked groggily. Why wasn’t Asmodeus touching her properly? She tried to move away from his cold, clammy hands.

There was a shuffling at her side, and suddenly, her heavy breathing wasn’t from lust.  _ That _ was currently bleeding out of her at an alarming rate and down into her cold feet. She felt a hand at her throat, barely there, the thumb was nearly parallel with her windpipe, and she froze. Everything began snapping into place, sense by sense: the way the carpet smelled she knew it had been Satan’s turn to clean the common rooms; the uneven airflow courtesy of the fireplaces raised the hairs on her body; she had the presence of mind now to recognize how unnaturally cold her feet were. The back of her throat tasted uncomfortably of cinnamon and she tried to swallow the burning.

“And you complained when I left perimeter patrol to you this week so I could take a refresher in psychic parasitism,” Asmodeus snarked behind her. It was aimed at Leviathan but had little bite to it.

“Why is she…” Leviathan began to ask.

“She was nervous to see you,” Asmodeus said. “Quite distraught.”

“Asmo!” she said, finally having enough wits about her to speak again.

He smoothed her hair back from her face as he returned her sight. His hands slid to either of her shoulders and then lifted away. It made the skin there feel gritty, whether from magics or goosebumps she wasn’t sure.

“It’s okay,” Leviathan murmured. He was barely audible and hadn’t released his barely there hold on her throat. “It’s okay to be upset. You just have to make sure to tell us…”

Slowly, she opened her eyes and turned toward his voice, following the arm she could see just below her chin. He was in his demonic form, she realized. The fuzzy feeling hadn’t fully left her and her eyes wandered, taking in the arched gills along the column of his neck. They looked like thousands of dark, feather combs and were lined with purple like the tips of his horns. She watched how his jacket constricted and relaxed over his upper chest. ‘How far down did they go?’ It wasn’t fair that he always looked so pretty. They swam together weekly; why hadn’t he ever let her see them before?

He steadfastly continued to look in the opposite direction of his extended arm, but when she grabbed his wrist his gills snapped shut and he ogled at her, seemingly surprised by her existence.

“Cozy,” she said, and pulled his hand away, yanking him forward with it to hug him instead.

“Ah! Asmo! What’s happening?” he asked, taking small steps backward. He was forced to halt when it became clear she would plank rather than let go. “I thought you fixed it!”

“I did,” Asmodeus said. Amusement coloured his response. “I thought she was supposed to fall asleep when she touched you?” 

“Leeviia-chan,” she said, “why won’t you hug me back?” Inhaling deeply into the fabric over his chest, she heard him ‘Eep!’ followed by Asmodeus’ soft laughter behind her. She knew she should pull away and give him space; it was a thought constantly niggling at the back of her mind. She’d much rather draw the zipper on his jacket higher and rest her hands over the mesh beneath.

An inch at a time, she unlaced her fingers from around Leviathan, trying to convince her arms to do the same. They’d become magnets, powered by the heavy knot in her stomach. It wasn’t fair. Leviathan never gave her a chance to touch him. He probably meant it when he said he was saving himself for Ruri-chan. “It’s not fair,” she muttered aloud.

“Oh fine,” she heard Asmodeus say. He must’ve seen Leviathan’s guppy-out-of-water expression. “This is what I get for working without my usual tool set.”

He wasn’t ungentle, but the suddenness with which Asmodeus gripped the back of her neck and tugged her away from her new safety blanket was jarring. Her arms refused to completely let go, but it was enough space for Asmodeus to tilt her head back and kiss her, if it could be called a kiss. 

Their lips touched but it felt hollow and cold as if he were using his mouth like a bookmark rather than reading her. His fingers weren’t tracing between the lines of her body language, instead he simply held her in place; the only true change she felt was the popping of her ears. Her eyes still open, she watched when he pulled away, curls of pink magic steaming out of his mouth, no they were from hers. He tried to tuck them back behind his lips, the way one would scrape a smear of jam off the corner of their mouth.

Immediately, her hands sprung apart and she stepped away from the both of them. “Levi, are you okay?” she asked, her hands covering the lower half of her face. “I’m so sorry! I don’t know what—” But she did know what. It felt the same as before. How had Asmodeus fixed it this time? A fizzle of something cold and dark slid up her spine and settled between her shoulder blades. Why hadn’t he done it last time? She blanched, not really seeing either of them as she thought back on what she’d gone through before. Would she have burnt up again? Worse, if even Leviathan wasn’t safe from her?

It wasn’t even 9 A.M yet and already the rug had been pulled out from under her feet. “How—” she started to ask before her voice rose into a squeaky pitch. “Why didn’t you stop it last time?” 

“Just where do you think I’ve been disappearing to all week?” Asmodeus asked, hands on his hips. He didn’t seem angry, but he wasn’t budging either.

‘Perimeter duty,’ she thought. ‘He’s been away a lot, that’s true.’ She looked between the two of them and saw how Leviathan had plastered himself to the opposite side of the doorframe. A good example: a strategic retreat, that’s what she needed. ‘Why does everything have to be so hard for me?’ Stepping back again, she turned, moving to escape to her room, even if it was in shambles. “I’ll come back for breakfast,” she said sullenly. 

“I can only work with my own energies,” Asmodeus said, his palms held up in a show of surrender. “This one’s all you, Levi.”

Did he just ignore her? Of course he did. ‘I’m here in an archdemon’s dining room, making a fuss, ruining their breakfast. This is the worst. I’m the worst. I mean I left a suicide voicemail and attempted death by their brother. It doesn’t get much worse than that.’

“Um,” Levi said. He pressed his gloved hands over his whole face. “You’re not the worst.”

Narrowing her eyes suspiciously, she stared back at him over her shoulder, trying to see past Leviathan’s shielding fingers. Was he reading her mind?

“I-I’m glad you called me.”

‘No miracle then. He heard it.’ Her heart clenched and she shut her eyes, abandoning the spark of hope she’d nurtured that someone had deleted the message first. 

“I've been waiting for you to show up,” he said against his palms and she slowly turned to look at him fully. His tail had risen up to shield his neck, like an overgrown boa constrictor. “You’re my Henry, so you’ve gotta stay alive.” He peeked between his fingers. “And if you can’t then I’ll definitely find your reincarnation...but alive is better.”

It was painful the way her shame and remorse shrunk her down. She felt two inches tall as she hazarded a nervous smile. “You’re not mad?” The cold that had replaced the earlier lust was still clammy in her palms. Her cheeks felt as though they held the only remaining heat in her body.

Leviathan’s fingers curled inward so that he could see over his knuckles. Only his purple hair blocking his view now, he looked surprised. “At first, I was, but-but that’s because you said you’d be my friend forever if you could, but I was just—you could’ve died!” he said, not pausing to breathe between thoughts. “And you called me but I didn't see it until after Mammon’s messages, and then everyone said you were safe and...”

He was still talking but she didn’t hear his stream of consciousness any more. The room swam as tears filled her eyes. If she could, she’d hug him again. Once it had finally sunk in that she was really and truly still alive, she’d dreaded talking to each of them. But she’d worried most about Leviathan’s reaction.

“Ah! Don’t cry!” he said, moving to hover just outside of her personal bubble. 

“It’s okay,” she said, reminded of how he’d panicked the same way in his bathtub not so long ago. “They’re just happy tears.” Leviathan’s eyes darted between her and Asmodeus, who nodded enthusiastically in her periphery. She willed her eyes to stop watering. “I’m happy you’ll still be my Player One.”

Red bloomed across Leviathan’s face and quickly spread down his neck. “I-I well.”

“Oooh, Levi,” What’re these? Asmodeus asked, picking up the pastries Leviathan had dropped on the floor.

She looked away from her flustered otaku to investigate Asmodeus’ newest exclamation of glee.

No longer pinned in place by her eyes, Leviathan sped past her to reach the upended pastries, He gave her a wide berth in the ornate doorway. “Get out of there. Shoo!” Leviathan said. “That’s Beel food now.”

Pivoting, hands on her hips, she frowned at the back of Leviathan’s head. “Did you seriously just designate floor-food as Beel-food?”

Leviathan looked back to her but was immediately distracted by his brother.

“Oooh but this one landed upright, and it has such pretty decoration!” Asmodeus said.

“Fine, ruin your diet. I tried.”

Stepping into the mess as well, she took the platter from Asmodeus and began to help pick up the array of sweet breakfast treats that had been sent flying. “Where did you get so many Danish pastries?” she asked. “Or, whatever these count as.” It felt light and flaky, like a croissant, but the smell was wrong. The filling didn’t seem to be the same in any of them. 

“Danish pastries?” Asmodeus asked, while absconding with a pastry glazed in something the same colour as his scarf.

“You know, like croissant dough, but with a jam in the middle or a chocolate spread?”

“Viennoiserie?” Asmodeus asked. He tilted his head to the side so that his hair fell away from his eyes.

“Viini sai.” Leviathan said. Only the way he squinted and looked up at the leftmost statue above the dining room’s gaudy trim let her know it was a question.

“What?” she asked. It was too early for this. She’d already gone from nervous, to thirsty, to shame, relief and annoyance in the span of a couple minutes. Just because it was pretty didn’t mean it was edible, even if this one did smell like fig jam.

“Wienerbrød!” Both demons shouted and pointed at one another over their mutual understanding.

She put her hands over her face and took a deep breath before standing up with the full platter. It was a new day.

* * *

“I’m surprised you’re already plating breakfast,” she said, following after Leviathan as they once more left the kitchen with their hands full of plates. ‘More like suspicious,’ she thought. There was nothing about this morning’s breakfast that said it was made by Leviathan. ‘Did he order in again?’

“Barbatos came by with the Chihuahua,” Leviathan said. “Something about Lucifer’s roar keeping Luke from sleeping. I was going to try and recreate that breakfast from ‘Do You Love Your Mom And Her Two-Hit Multi-Target Attacks?’ but apparently the two of them were up baking all night.”

“Barbatos really should know better than to skimp on sleep,” Asmodeus said. He’d seated himself at the table, taking up his assigned chair for this rotation. It was musical chairs every fortnight, for all of them except for Satan and Lucifer. Those two were never willing to relinquish the “head” of the table, though who had the head and who had the foot had never been said aloud.

When they finally broke  _ this _ table, like they had many other tables in the house, she was going to get Diavolo on-side to help her smuggle in a round table. He’d only ask for photographic evidence in return and she’d get to watch their confusion.

“Barbatos controls time,” Leviathan said with an accompanying roll of his eyes. He filled the remainder of the table with his dishes before turning to begin stocking the sideboard. “I’m sure he can find time for a nap.”

She’d never considered that before. Setting down the pitcher of phantom water, which she’d dutifully carried out, she paused. ‘Is that what filled all of Diavolo’s guest quarters when there were no delegates to entertain? Hundreds of different versions of sleeping Barbatos who had all pinpointed the calmest day of the Devildom and regularly returned for naps?’

The sound of Asmodeus clearing his throat brought her attention back to their quiet morning together. Once again Leviathan was awkwardly straddling the threshold of the dining room and kitchen, seemingly unwilling to let her out of his sight but also unwilling to say anything about it either.

Quickly, she sprung back into motion, pouring a glass of water and setting it near Asmodeus. Leviathan hadn’t understood the subtle nudge, but it couldn’t hurt to cover the remainder of the helpful hint with a show of appreciation. Without further ado, she made her way toward Leviathan and the kitchen, to collect the last of the breakfast and set a timer for the brewing and steeping required for her not-so-morning demons.

When she returned, with Leviathan making his way to his designated seat in advance of her, she almost stumbled: a shock of white hair peaked above the tall backrest where there should have been black. She hadn’t expected  _ anyone _ in that seat today. After the incident in the crypt, she hadn’t seen Lucifer for two days. After the initial chaos of her death had died down, she hadn’t seen him for five. How long would he stay away from his troop after she’d stabbed him and bruised his pride?

“Come sit next to us, Dearest!” Asmodeus said, catching her hesitation. He patted the chair Belphegor usually took.

‘Some days, Asmodeus is a godsent,’ she thought before catching herself. ‘Well, whatever idiom matches that.’ It was eye opening to realize how much religion painted her secular vocabulary. Saying “Oh, my god” in front of Satan while at the Royal Mausoleum had earned her a book on Devildom appropriate vernacular. The massive, black stone steles adorning the front of the mausoleum, inscribed with what amounted to the Devildom’s code of laws and precedents, were left for another day. She grinned to herself. The older laws accounted for why the whole family was always roped in for a particular greed demon’s payment plans. It was the bane of Lucifer’s existence.

With no sign of Satan in the vicinity, she walked purposefully over to the foot of the table and flounced herself down into the chair to stare back at Mammon instead. He looked far too serious and puffed up for his own good. She waited, determined to figure out his angle. He’d begged on his knees for her life yesterday, but today he hadn’t bothered to greet her and looked distant, a cockiness, specific to him, that she hadn’t expected.

Leviathan stood to reach into the middle of the table, and then shook what looked like jelly beans into his bowl only for them to splatter loudly. It drew her gaze over to him. She didn’t turn her head but it was enough for him to begin to answer, “Uhm...”

Turning her face minutely toward Leviathan, she raised a single eyebrow.

“It’s milk stew in baked, giant shadow sea cucumber balls,” he said, floundering until Asmodeus pinched the fabric of Leviathan’s jacket at his elbow and tugged him back into his seat.

The wink Asmodeus sent her way put a thrill through her, but she tried to remain imperious looking and turned her attention back to Mammon. The last thing she wanted was Leviathan drawing back into his shell; she’d felt him closing up more and more with each trip to the kitchen. It seemed counter-intuitive but he was riled up equally by praise and disdain. If Asmodeus was still amused then she’d at least pulled Leviathan’s preoccupation away from her mortal fate and back to something manageable like arousal. 

When there wasn't a motive behind his listening in, Mammon didn't give off the curious excitement that usually had him leaning intently toward others conversations. Instead, as now, he looked alert while he watched and thought, only a slight frown detracting the otherwise vacant expression. “What’re ya starin’ at?” he asked grumpily. His eyes scanned over her. 

“My first,” she said innocently and reached ahead of her for a Purgatory-style biscuit. 

His reaction was instantaneous. Traces of a smug smile tried to take up residence on his face but he fought against it. It didn't hinder him from holding his chin higher, or from letting his pleased response settle into crinkles at the corners of his eyes.

Before she could rally and see what else she could draw out of Mammon, a hand landed gently on her shoulder. Bright green nails squeezed lightly. 

“Good morning,” Satan said, tiredly but without discontent.

She wanted to stand and step onto the chair to wrap her arms around him. ‘Brilliant demon.’ Looking up at him, he appeared wan. She settled for bringing her hand up over his instead of bombarding him with questions and affection. “Morning,” she said, her voice sounding too awed and sweet. She wanted to kick herself when she heard Asmodeus’ hum of interest.

Vacating the seat, she said “I nabbed you a Purgatory biscuit. I can’t tell if they’re filled with redxred apple paste or red spider core though.”

“The best of sweet or savory then,” Satan said, but his eyes were no longer on her.

“Out,” Lucifer said as he strode into the room, his command lazy and indirect.

Mammon was out of his chair in an instant and crossed his leader’s path to reach his own chair. 

“We are searchlights, we can see in the dark!” Leviathan said suddenly, breaking the tension that was about to grow into silence. The melody was completely lost in his explosive delivery.

For a moment, she stared at him in confusion. Then it clicked. A song lyric. Was he saying he understood or that he could see her concern? It was too vague. Her eyes flitted to the head of the table as she moved away from her chair and the warmth of Satan’s hand on her. “And you sold us down the river too far,” she said as slowly and cautiously as the steps she took. 

“Um…” Leviathan looked at the table, his head moved from side to side, looking over the various dishes and cutlery as if they held words for him. “We are problems that want to be solved.” 

“You fooled us, enough is enough,” she said quietly, stopping between her usual chair and Mammon in his seat. She strummed her fingers on the wood of either chair and practically felt the way Mammon hummed with apprehension next to her. Lucifer’s presence was unexpected. 

He’d sat down during the exchange, but, as studiously as he ignored them, she knew he was listening, gleaning what he could.

A chittering sound above drew her attention away from the swirling pit in her stomach. “Thank you, Publedina,” she said when she saw the wombat messenger. If her mal’akh was here then it meant the tea was finished steeping. She wiggled her jaw from side to side, loosening the tightness there, before giving Leviathan an inkling of her intentions. “Wishful Drinking by Tessa Violet.” 

He frowned, deep in thought before finally diving into the Devilnet for hints of the obscure reference.

“Satan, can I get you a cuppa while I’m in the kitchen?” she asked.

“Thank you. Yes,” Satan said, clearly surprised to be suddenly roped into the cryptic goings on. 

With a soft smile for him, she turned on her heel and made her way past the rest of the table to the kitchen doors, steadfastly ignoring Lucifer. At least she’d been able to warn Leviathan of her avoidance tactics. 


	118. Distraction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC just wants to have a pleasant meal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their beta reading ❣️

**49th Day, Saturday**

They were talking too low and too quickly for her to decipher what they were saying when she walked back into the dining room, a mug in either of her hands; once they noticed her their cutting hisses and growls stopped abruptly. She saw the calculating look that passed between the twins, who must’ve joined the table while she’d been busy with cream and sugar.

The bitterness she’d caught in their speech was likely about yesterday, but, for just a little while longer, she’d like to enjoy the morning and would do her best to do so. “Levi, would you be able to find me a map of the Devildom after breakfast?” she asked without batting an eye at the abrupt end to the conversation before her.

“Do you need the capital?” Leviathan asked, quick to latch on to her lead.

“Yes. Though I don’t care where we’re floating over the flux streams, I just need topography for the main land mass,” she said, making her happiness at his quick response known by the wide smile she offered. “The nearest tributary states would be helpful too but not necessary.”

Satan perked up at the mention of cartography and she continued making her way over to him.

He’d done a remarkable job helping ground her yesterday; she hadn’t felt so comfortable and confident since before she’d first fallen into hell. It didn’t mean she was ready for round two yet, but, at the very least, she might not be out of commission when the seven of them inevitably hashed things out. Then again, it might be better to get it out of everyone’s systems before she pitched her idea to them.

Without seeing Leviathan raise a hand to catch her attention, she answered his impending question. “And, no, I don’t need the Fae realm. I’m aware it pops up wherever it feels like.” She set the tea down on Satan’s left side only to have her hand caught as she released the vessel.

“This isn’t my mug,” Satan said, eyeing the white ceramic with interest. His hand around hers was soft.

“It's new,” she said simply, trying not to blush as he brought her knuckles to his lips.

“Thank you.”

Before he could let go of her hand, she turned it in his grasp and brought it back up to cup his cheek, holding him in place just long enough for her to give him a peck on the opposite cheek. “Thank _ you. _ ”

Two different voices shouted their displeasure at the display and she scrutinized both Mammon and Belphegor, her free hand going to her hip after Satan let it slip away from him. They were quick to close their mouths, but she still heard their grumbling.

“Where’s  _ my _ kiss?” Asmodeus asked.

Shooting him an incredulous look, she walked back to her own seat, with her own coffee in hand. “You,” she said, wagging a finger at him, “have already had yours.” 

“What about mine?” Beelzebub asked. 

It took her by surprise. There was little space between them already as she’d been about to sit down, her chair bookending her next to him. He hadn’t been loud, but there was more confidence in his direct question than she was used to. Usually, after asking to hold her hand he’d look away or find something for them to talk about. This was new. 

She could feel the eyes of the table on them. The small, cheeky grin he gave, told her that he knew he was putting her on the spot. “Right,” she said with a soft laugh. She wouldn’t dissuade him. It was nice to see him being more forward, even if Mammon was making a low level grumble that she felt through her socked feet.

Just as she was about to lean in, Beelzebub pulled back, quickly making a space on the table. “For your coffee,” he said and wiped crumbs from his face with his thumb.

The way he beamed at her made her forget what her lungs were supposed to be doing. It was like watching all of the lanterns in her room magically alight in the morning. How could she ever be expected to turn him away when he looked at her like that?

She set her coffee down and the moment her fingertips left the handle Beelzebub pulled her flush against his seated form. Where she’d expected ferocity, based on the quickness of his hands, she found tenderness. His softness made her giddy and she had to actively keep herself from giggling against his lips.

Just as quickly as she found herself surrounded by Beelzebub’s warmth, she was jerked away with an “Eeep!” On instinct she covered her ears and Mammon shouted something over her head. She was partially in his lap and partially in his arms, as he hadn’t decided whether to sit or stand.

Once her brain caught up to her predicament, she kept the hand nearest his face covering her ear and used the other to cover Mammon's mouth. “That’s quite enough,” she said, primly, as if she hadn’t just been making out at the breakfast table.

“Indeed,” Lucifer said. “Public displays of affection are not to be—”

“Can’t we just eat?” Belphegor asked. He speared a slice of breakfast cake from a platter and shook it onto his plate. “I can’t focus on eating with Mammon’s wailing.” He didn’t seem upset with her, not with his disdain so singularly targeting Lucifer; it sounded as though Mammon was an afterthought. “Besides, we’re at home. It’s not exactly public.”

She could feel Lucifer’s disapproval without looking to confirm his sour expression. ‘How much will his guilt keep him quiet today?’ she wondered. More importantly, how far would her demons push their luck in challenging Lucifer’s boundaries? Should she rein them in or let them jostle for short-lived supremacy?

By Asmodeus’ slow wiggle, in his seat, he'd clearly enjoyed the show she and Beelzebub had put on, only the crackling purple energy of Leviathan, at his side, seemed to be tempering his reaction. Otherwise, she suspected Asmodeus would've already been out of his chair, inviting himself to join.

Unshielding her ear, she dropped her hand down to Mammon’s forearm, where it lay across her ribs. She could feel the thrum of his power at her back; it was hot and expanded with each breath he took. ‘Is this an affection required problem or a quiet needed problem?’ she wondered. 

With a double tap of her palm against the back of his wrist, he released her back onto her own feet, with the chair between her and Beelzebub. Sometimes, it was enough to settle his mood if Mammon took the needed time to think without distraction. She would have to be more diplomatic if she wanted to give him time to sort himself. 

“Let’s eat,” she said and took her seat. It was only then, when a mountain of food materialized on her left, that she realized Beelzebub hadn’t had any food on his plate. She’d been too distracted by the butterflies he’d let loose in her stomach.

At least the mountain would partially block out Lucifer. What was she supposed to say to him? Was she supposed to say anything? She didn't want to look at him. 

But this was a good test. If she wanted to pull off her plan, then she’d need to be able to succeed in shepherding the flow of conversation here,  _ especially _ with Lucifer present. If that wasn’t possible, she’d need to reassess her skills. 

“What were you working on when I interrupted you yesterday, Satan?” she asked. “I know you’re rarely idle.”

For a moment, he looked at her warily before giving her a smile; it matched the warmth in his eyes, and she could almost hear his thoughts. This was his mistress asking after all, not Mammon looking for something to exploit, or Lucifer for something to criticize. 

“I’m working on a short study aimed at showing the relation between theoretical studies about the representation of light and shadow, and the knowledge and the beliefs in the ancient and Middle time with the material characters of architecture.”

Looking away, she picked up what looked like a yorkshire pudding that had made its way to her plate. She nodded along. “What precisely does that mean?” she asked. The large popover was halfway to her mouth before she realized there was some variety of meat inside it. She closed her eyes for a moment in regret and then shoved the food into her mouth. Mystery meat was never her favourite, and ‘precisely’ was not the word she should have chosen.

“I’m glad you asked,” Satan said, all smiles as his hands forgot about his cutlery in favour of gesturing his excitement over the topic. “I’ve been analyzing examples from the ancient and Middle age to find elements, like the orientation of ancient buildings according to cosmic symbols, or use of light to mark the time and the calendar.” 

She nodded again, waiting for it. It was too simple. There was still the Leviathan-sized knowledge that had yet to make its escape from Satan. At least Mammon’s adversarial aura had started to ebb. The sharp looks he'd been shooting over her head toward Beelzebub had stopped. As a reward for playing nice, she put her hand on his knee and ignored how he jerked at the unexpected touch. It was a platonic reassurance, despite the warmth coursing through her that encouraged more. Even if she wanted to spoil him rotten, she had to stick to her word: head pats, cheek kisses, safe touches, and nothing more.

“You see, architectural space is expressed by the union between matter and light, texture and perception, mediated by surfaces, materials, volumes and colours,” Satan continued. Absentmindedly, he took a sip of his tea, still ignoring his plate.

Humming her understanding around a mouthful of food, she encouraged him to continue while the rest of the table scraped their cutlery on their plates, discontented but unwilling to break the rocky cease-fire.

She moved her thumb in what she hoped was a soothing manner and was pleased to feel Mammon’s leg relax. The black tapir roast slice she’d bitten into tasted charred and she set the remainder down on her plate. It was just enough movement to snap him out of staring at her like she’d grown a second head.

“Surprisingly, the relationship between light and space has been known even amongst the early human builders,” Satan continued, “which, in elevating the monoliths, have attempted to relate them to the movement of the sun and stars.”

It was safe to hazard a guess this morning; Satan rarely derided her understanding any longer, only when he thought she hadn’t been attentive. With her left hand over her mouth and food in her cheek, she asked, “Like sundials?”

“Not quite what I was hoping you’d envision, no.” His plain, white mug now passed from one hand into the other so that he could better gesticulate. “Architecture was used as a verification tool of cosmic observations, and at the same time for communication and collective celebration of the first major discoveries derived from the observation of nature.”

The sensation of being stared at returned and she quickly darted her vision across the table before bringing her attention back to Satan. Asmodeus was engrossed in a study of Leviathan’s reactions for some reason. Her otaku was staring at a gaming device, his lips twitching at Satan’s claim. Mammon's mouth was full of what she thought was an egg tart; that only left three, but she couldn’t see Beelzebub with how far she'd turned toward Satan, and Belphegor was partially obscured by Beelzebub's plate, which seemed more likely, with each passing minute, to be able to hold the entire table’s bounty.

“Wouldn’t that have occurred across multiple ages then? And places?” she asked. At the rate Satan was instructing, he wouldn’t finish his tea before breakfast was over. She swallowed down the bitter meat and peeked over at Belphegor: eating with his eyes closed, his cheek pressed to the table. 

“I knew you would ask that!” Satan said, his deflation over her previous lack of comprehension now forgotten. He was eager now. “I suspect you can cite numerous examples of architecture built according to specific geometrical relationships associated with astronomical observations.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that...” she said, “but I bet your brothers might have some good examples. Don’t you gentlemen?” She took up a spoon in her left hand and coated it in a red jelly that had appeared on her plate. They were _ not  _ going to sit through a silent meal, the awkwardness of trying to leave the table at the end of it wasn’t worth the current false peace. If there weren’t any other volunteers, they would be voluntold. She occupied herself with tasting the jelly and avoided meeting Satan's eyes.

Satan’s shoulders sunk with what he likely thought was her dismissal. There were a few anxious looks around the table. She looked back over her shoulder to find Beelzebub staring at her intently: mystery solved.

Perking up at hearing the word “bet” Mammon seemed more attentive but remained silent. His hand slid over hers, not squeezing or caressing, just atop of hers, stilling her thumb.

Was that a truce for them? Her stomach did a little flip and she looked back down at her plate. There were a number of what looked to be warm, pumpkin puffs surrounding her abandoned tapir meat.

“M-My...” Leviathan cleared his throat. “My temple in Atlantis pointed toward the sun and used the North star as an axis.”

She felt his tail sneak along her socked foot and take up residence around her ankle. Adorable. If she were a wicked human, she’d use her other foot to rub up along the appendage as far as she could reach. 'Maybe another day,' she thought with a smile. She’d already hugged him this morning.

“Exactly!” Satan thrust his hand toward Leviathan enthusiastically, causing his brother to withdraw just as quickly. “The architect had the task of using mathematics, geometry, and astronomy to express symbolically the liturgical function of the cult.” 

“Heeey, I was trying to be nice. You didn’t have to call it a cult,” Leviathan said.

Satan rolled his eyes but there was no malice behind it. “I didn’t mean the sinister way it's used nowadays.” He took another sip of his tea and finally began putting food on his plate as he noticed the growing sparsity of the table. “You should know by now that I meant a system of religious veneration and devotion.”

A warm hand at her ribs told her Beelzebub wanted her attention. With Satan distracted she pivoted back to the center of her seat.

“You need to eat more,” Beelzebub whispered to her. “Remember, you are what you eat?”

Leviathan had grumbled to himself before growing louder. “I know it wasn’t the best design job, but you didn’t have to assume a human did it!"

‘Ouch,’ she thought, but she’d let it slide for now, she was preoccupied with Beelzebub's request. She turned to him properly, never moving her hand from under Mammon’s, and waited until Beelzebub’s mouth wasn’t quite so full. “I’m from Yorkshire, fat and podgy at the bottom, and full of hot air?” she asked with one eyebrow raised.

Both of Beelzebub’s forearms landed on the table, his face almost going into the mound of food before him as he coughed and wheezed.

"Ah jeez, Beel. Ya gotta chew first," Mammon said, moving his plate further toward Satan, as if it might be shielded there from Beelzebub's imaginary germs.

“You made that?” Satan’s mouth gaped for a moment before he looked down at his hand; he'd accidentally placed in some sort of food mash. Swiftly, he set down his mug and wiped off the fingers with a napkin. So enamoured with their topic, he didn't even spare a scowl for the mess.

Leviathan turned nearly as red as when she’d hugged him, and sunk low in his chair just as Belphegor cracked an eye open and shot her a wide grin. She'd wondered if he'd acknowledge she'd nearly killed Beelzebub again with laughter.

“I told you Levi was great at drawing,” she said to Satan, attempting to keep the discussion going and pretend as though she hadn’t made Beelzebub inhale a shadow chocolate-dipped donut deep into his lungs.

“Ya talk like we haven’t all practiced drawin,’” Mammon said, finally joining in. 

She'd seen a hastily erased doodle he'd made on a classroom chalkboard once: an exceptionally detailed rendering of the two of them holding hands inside a giant heart shape. “Hmm,” she said and leant against Mammon’s shoulder, effectively silencing him. “You’re pretty good at drawing too, Mammon, and Asmo designs plenty of cute things. I don’t know about Beel though.” Tilting her face toward Beelzebub to see his reaction, she managed not to lift her head from Mammon’s bicep. 

Beelzebub was still red-faced as he drank down a pitcher of devil mango juice. She’d diluted it with water to make it stretch further and, thankfully, he hadn’t seemed to have noticed yet.

“What about me?” Belphegor asked. He sat up and stretched; his fork, still in hand, nearly reached Lucifer’s face. 

The top of Beelzebub's food mountain shifted lower as part of the base collapsed, and she could see that, though Belphegor held the fork in the air longer than necessary, Lucifer didn’t flinch. 'Of course he wouldn't.'

“You’re a terrible artist, Belphie,” she said with good humour colouring her response. He was relegated to writing letters on banners. At his scrunched up, grumpy pout, she puckered her lips at him and threw him a wink. “Your penmanship is very beautiful though.” 

This was nice. It felt like her internal metronome was finally clicking steadily, returning to a constant and reliable tempo. 

This was manageable. She could practically hear her own unwavering measure in the chaos and cross-talk around her.

“What dimensions did you work with on that, Levi?” Satan asked, clearly annoyed by the interruption. “Did you use the decagon figure? I only stopped by once and don’t have a proper reference. Most temples since then have used a harmonic division of a large circle for fives or tens.”

“The Pythagorean method?” Leviathan balked. “Pfft! The collegia fabrorum is applied on the horizontal plane and the vertical plane with it, but that wasn’t complex enough.” He tucked his head back, creating a double chin to show his disgust at the idea. “With time it would’ve gotten better. I just didn’t expect the earthquake.” Just as quickly as he'd risen up in his seat to argue, Leviathan shrunk down once more. With each tap together of his pointer fingers in front of his chest, came a squeeze of his tail around her leg. She said nothing, content to be worried at, like a security blanket, for now.

Asmodeus laughed and fanned the air with a limp hand. “Levi’s being too modest. It flowed like water. The golden ratio was everything. It was a palace fit for  _ me _ !”

“I-I, well, it wasn’t…you really think so?” Leviathan asked.

Asmodeus spoke over him before he could continue. “Unless you’re still being salty about Aryabhata and Fibronacci figuring out the mathematics?”

The rhythmic squeezing around her ankle should have zoned her in on Leviathan's grousing, but Beelzebub's foot nudging her heel brought her attention to him instead. That was twice now that she'd gotten him with the same line, but his embarrassment hadn't slowed him from adding new bits and pieces to her plate. 

"Coarse radish leaves should help with the bitterness," Beelzebub said, and shredded greenery over the abandoned centerpiece of her plate. He’d cleared the donut from his lungs, but wasn’t yet daring to look at her. 

Her life was so strange. She felt a blush rising to her cheeks at his gentle attention and looked down at her plate, glancing up through her lashes to watch him cut the root with a claw, as if he were a server with parmesan cheese. Had she made such an obvious face when eating the black tapir roast or was he just that perceptive?

An inadvertent squeeze of her hand by Mammon pulled her out of her thoughts. "No name calling," she said purely out of habit, having long since lost the train of the conversation. They only paused for a moment so she must've been right.

_ Tick. Tick. Tick.  _ Her internal metre continued along: a flexible rubato in between the regular steady beating of her heart. She knew she’d stayed in the breaking room long after she’d fallen asleep; whatever Satan had done from there was enough to let her ignore the arrogant elephant in the room without feeling like a live wire, and she was grateful for it.

“Thank you,” she said to Beelzebub, and lifted the morsel to her mouth once more. He was right. It did taste better. As she nodded her appreciation, his foot behind hers until his instep was snug against her own. Apparently, it was her turn to nearly choke on her food. Beelzebub was rarely this forward. 

If she hadn’t felt Asmodeus’ magic leave her earlier, she would’ve blamed him, but she knew the growing heat between her thighs was all her this time. _Tick_.Tick. _Tick._ Tick. _Tick._ Tick. She took another bite and chewed slowly. It was oddly arousing watching Beelzebub savour her meal vicariously. Pinned in place by his gaze, she realized she really was stuck, physically. Other than the hand, currently in use to feed herself, each of her limbs was held in place. The thought sent an unexpected jolt of want through her. ‘Get it together, woman! You had Asmodeus this morning; that’s more than most humans can manage in a lifetime.’

As if he could hear her, Asmodeus caught her eye and smirked at her; but his attention was gone as quickly as it had come, and he dived back into the conversation, all sass and hair flicks. 

Looking back down at her plate she tried to choose something that wouldn’t require the use of both hands. The small griddle cakes looked manageable with a fork. An image of Belphegor holding her chin and telling her to open her mouth flickered through her mind. She always blew off his attempts to feed her. She wasn’t a child in need of feeding and she never let Asmodeus get away with it either, but, just this once, she was tempted. She readjusted in her seat as inconspicuously as possible.

Other than Beelzebub and Asmodeus, no one seemed to notice the growing exhilaration she felt as the possibilities tumbled through her head. Leviathan would jealously guard her leg, there would be no way to press her knees together, not with Beelzebub nibbling up the inside of her other thigh. 

Asmodeus had looked over at her again and was beginning to stare. She swallowed hard, trying to banish the thoughts of her fingers tightening their grip in Mammon’s hair while her other hand was on Belphegor’s bare chest, the only thing to keep him at bay.

“How exceptionally clever!” Satan said loudly. “Why have we never created anything together before? You know they went on to keep using those formulae, still do: the Parthenon, that Mosque at Uqba, Cheops’ Pyramid…”

The table turned their attention as one back to Satan.  ‘He would’ve made a fine angel,’ she thought. ‘Always rescuing me. His wrath could easily be passed off as righteous fury.’ She allowed herself to zone out and enjoy her coffee, putting her libido to bed for now, content in the peace she’d won for herself.  _ Tick. Tick. Tick. _


	119. Tick. Tick. Tick. Boom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MC tries to get through breakfast with the uneasy truce in place. If she can pull it off, her plan for later should go down smoothly.
> 
> 49th Day, Saturday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, big thank you to ElvishDork and Sarchopathic for their constant encouragement and eagle eyes.

Was that music? Had one of them left their sound system on before coming down to breakfast? ‘It would have had to have a lull in the tracks during all of the awkward silences,’ she thought. At first, it had sounded like fingers snapping, but now she could hear the bass above them, which meant it would mostly likely be from Lucifer’s room?

“You can hear that right?” she whispered to Mammon just as he took a breath between retorts. It was too muffled for her to make out.

Her brow, wrinkled with confusion, and it made Mammon do a double take. The debate continued on between Asmodeus, Leviathan, and Satan without pause. “Whaddya mean?” he asked, not bothering to whisper. “Of course I hear the…” He jerked his chin up and stared over her head. “Fuck, that’s not good.”

Suddenly, the entire table was looking at her. But it was Mammon’s eyes that bore into her the hardest when he finally looked back to her.

_Ich will...Ich will…_

She could hear her heartbeat in her ears, as loud as the metronome she’d imagined earlier. ‘Slow, easy breaths,’ she thought, lightheaded from the sudden tachycardia and the matching rhythm overhead. ‘This is a surprise but not impossible. Just one new curveball. Breathe.’

_Suspense is controlling my mind_

_I cannot find the way out of here._

‘Think happy thoughts.’ She swallowed hard. ‘Think anything but this.’ 

_I want you by my side..._

_So that I never feel alone again._

There was no controlling the pained scrunch of her brow, even as she shut her eyes and tried to slow her breathing further. “Publedina, come here,” she said, her throat tight. The mal’akh was floating somewhere above them, likely dipping and diving for her own amusement.

Her palms were sweating but when she closed her eyes the intensity of her vulnerability receded, if only in her mind. ‘This can be managed. I just have to get her down. Just have to touch her.’ She beckoned her messenger with an ominous tone, “Publedina.”

* * *

Mammon let go of her hand at the low warning in her voice; she kept hers in place, no longer soft on his thigh but digging into the sides of his knee until it tingled strangely. “Oi, you okay in there?” 

Yesterday, she’d enjoyed playing the song game with the mal’akh, but now she looked grim. 

Where before the sound overhead had been pulsating and attention grabbing, now it dropped off. The tempo of Publedina's sound was faster than before, yet, somehow, the tinkling piano notes felt slower and haunting, like remembered rainfall. The minor key made it seem solemn, yet it also relaxed the tension in his shoulders. His human was good like that. Always able to talk them down.

“'Beethoven's Silence' by Cortazar?” Lucifer asked, his face blank despite his obvious curiosity. “I wasn’t expecting a concerto while breaking our fast.” He dipped his spoon back into his bowl.

“I’m good,” she said with her jaw clenched tight. She sucked air between her gritted teeth and blew it back out harshly.

Like he was gonna believe that. Mammon heard that static overhead, knew that she couldn’t even concentrate well enough to think of a song. How stupid did she think he was? “‘Course ya are. You’re with the Great Mammon.” 

Soft notes, banjo strings, echoed through the room and a man’s voice he didn’t recognize sang tersely as the music began to thunder. 

_So crawl on my belly ’til the sun goes down. I’ll never wear your broken crown..._

Mammon saw Beelzebub moving to reach for her, but he was moving on instinct already, pulling her chair so that it was flush against his own. “So, Human. How about you and the Great Mammon skip out on breakfast and go have some fun?” he asked quickly. Whatever was wrong, staying here with these six wasn’t going to make it better. He’d take her back to his room where they could watch movies all day. His mini-fridge probably still had snacks in it. They could figure out the stupid messenger-boom-box there.

When he went to put his arm around her, she flopped forward onto the table, her forehead resting on her overlapping hands between their plates. His hand lingered in mid air. Where was he supposed to put it now? 

The speed with which the glowing wombat was cycling through sounds was becoming dizzying.

_Take my head away from me_

_Antoinette, sweet Marie_

_Chop it off, squeaky clean_

“I got thoughts nobody needs,” she muttered into the tablecloth just before Leviathan started babbling.

Asmodeus was being quiet, much too quiet, and it was unnerving, as if he were stalking prey without moving from his seat. 

“Will you get that damn thing down here!” Mammon shouted. 

Crossing his arms and leaning back into his seat, Asmodeus huffed before complaining. “I can’t. I gave her full control of Publedina. She doesn’t belong to me anymore.”

‘What a crock of shit.’ Except for when they traded energy like this, there was never a hint of the mal’akh on her. He was going to pin Asmodeus to a wall like a butterfly after this. There’d be no more club secrets.

“What?” Leviathan asked, his question loud enough to actually drown out the rise and fall of the foreign music. It was becoming deafening.

Beelzebub had lost all focus on his food and Belphegor was already standing; if he hadn’t touched her they would’ve taken her away.

Faster than he would’ve liked, Mammon dropped his hand to her back, moving with less care than usual. She gave a disgruntled squeak but said nothing else. Obviously, still concentrating on trying to pull her mind inward. 

_Crashing, hit a wall...Right now I need a miracle_

Mammon’s hand froze before he could even begin to pet her with the soothing circles he’d intended. He _heard_ it. It wasn’t just noise, or her thoughts jumping from melody to melody. Suddenly, he wanted to be the one hiding his face in the tablecloth. He wanted to lift her up and bundle her away, to where no one could find them, so that he could listen to her and nothing else. Had the others noticed? His eyes darted between each of them. 

There was concern, but they weren’t responding, not the way they would if they could hear this new language. Satan was going to be pissed that he hadn’t noticed first.

Slowly, Mammon moved his hand over her back, trying to calm his mistress.

_Talkin' in my sleep at night, makin' myself crazy...I got new rules, I count 'em_

The lyrics didn’t always make sense to him, but the cacophony they created wasn’t so different from Infernal. He just had to know what to look for. When the overlapping rhythms hiccoughed, or strained violins shot through the usual rowdy beats, he could feel her struggle through the vibrations in the air.

Satan cleared his throat, and cautiously she looked up at him. He'd been watching studiously, his elbow on the table so that he could rest his chin there while he drank his tea. Slowly, over enunciating, likely so she could read his lips over the noise, he said: 

> "Come to the edge,” he said. / They said, “We are afraid.” 

The eye contact between them was unwavering. Usually, Mammon would turn his nose up and roll his eyes at their poetry, but it made the tension in her back lessen and the swell of noise overhead died down by half. Whatever he was doing was working.

Resting her chin where her forehead had previously lain, she spoke the matching couplet: 

> "Come to the edge," he said. / They came. 

There was a curl of a smile sneaking its way over Satan’s lips and he quickly hid it behind his boring, white mug. It did nothing to hide the mischief in his eyes. “He pushed them..../ And they flew.”

Music continued to warble overhead, but now the songs were quieter and seemed to sync up with one another, more like a layered DJ mix than the muddy sound from before. When she shifted in her seat, trying to bring her leg back in line, it was only then that Mammon noticed that Beelzebub had her trapped in what amounted to a leglock. The refrain from ‘Cheerleader’ only helped to underline where her attention was.

Mammon wanted to snap at her for scaring him like that, but how could he when a hint of her smile was starting to show through again. The music overhead sounded bumbling and he knew she was embarrassed, no, maybe uncertain, or a mixture of the two. He grinned madly to himself and grabbed her up into an awkward hug that dug her shoulder into his sternum. “Idiot. I’m right here,” he said into her hair. “Ya got nothin’ ta worry about.” They hadn’t spoken since she’d disappeared from his arms, but Lucifer had promised to find a way forward, there was no need to choose; he could stay at her side without a second thought. She was safe. Everything would be fine.

It wasn’t Asmodeus’ catcalling and kissing noises that made Mammon release her; she’d relaxed against him and didn’t seem to be in any hurry to leave. Lucifer’s voice was what opened his arms. The seriousness of the order created an instant gap and Mammon’s stomach dropped. He was still trained to respond immediately to Lucifer’s commands and he’d let her go without thinking. Yesterday was the third time he’d nearly lost her, and here he was carelessly letting go of her because Lucifer said so. 

There was a cold pit inside him that grew as he remembered the feeling of her dissipating against his body. Decorum didn't matter at the table right now. A few more seconds of having her in his embrace didn’t mean she was gonna go hungry. The memory of Lucifer’s smile, in the midst of his disordered bedroom, should have been enough for Mammon to continue to hold her fast. Did Lucifer clear his throat like that because of the way his human blushed or because the blush wasn’t for him? Their end goals aligned, but would their plans to get there? He _shouldn’t_ have let go.

He’d floundered there on the scorched floor for far too long, long after Lucifer had walked past him to hunt her down. Just how was Lucifer going to turn this temporary truce into a lasting peace if he kept holding the reins so tightly? 

Beelzebub pulled their mistress’ chair back toward him and looked her over, starting with her hands. The layers of sound overlapped too greatly for Mammon to pick out any one song. She sounded overwhelmed, and his suspicions were confirmed when she closed her eyes and attempted to breathe quietly.

The little club, belonging to the middle children, was going to be getting a very thorough interrogation as soon as Mammon had a chance to corner them. Fuck that, he was going to order them to his room if he had to. What did they know that he didn’t? Asmodeus didn’t seem to recognize what Mammon was hearing, but he still looked too pleased with himself. Satan had seemed to know just what to say to focus her, and even Leviathan had his own little pidgin language with her. The fact that the twins didn’t seem particularly phased was strange enough to require interrogation as well. 

Lucifer, pretending to eat his meal and see nothing, would have to wait. There were too many things to investigate first. 

The gentle clinking of everyone eating resumed with the music still loudly blaring overhead. Peculiarities were expected when the foundations of magic were still being mastered. Even Belphegor had returned to his seat, only one suspicious eye half open. 

Leviathan opened his mouth to say something, probably to cajole her into another round of the game. But a few notes from a ukulele rang out. And then, without warning, the dam broke. There was no other music playing, no layers, only the voices of the singers harmonizing. When she slammed her hands on the table and pushed back her chair it silenced the easiness that had just returned to the room.

“Belit?” Beelzebub asked, now standing at her side, his hands on her shaking shoulders.

Frustration roiled under Mammon’s skin. _He_ should be the one at her side.

“How dare you,” she whispered to the air above her. “How dare you!” She violently shrugged Beelzebub’s hands off her shoulders and turned to stand upon her chair: one foot up, while the other was still held down by Leviathan’s tail at her ankle. “Stop this right now!” she shouted up to the brown ball of light, too focused on the mal’akh to even register Leviathan.

‘Shit. Shit. Shit.’ Mammon rose from his seat as well. He glanced over to Satan only to have his fears confirmed. The green glow around him was growing brighter despite how he lounged lazily in his seat. She did stupid shit when she was this angry.

The sound above was cut short, and Mammon watched her relax for a millisecond, but every line of her body went taut when the shouts and squeal of tires bounced off the walls. 

“Levi, let go!” she shouted, finally looking at him over her shoulder.

“Not gonna happen, Normie!” Leviathan said, his arms atop the table like a life preserver, as he attempted to keep from being pulled under the table. “Your brain’ll melt!”

Mammon didn’t understand what was going on, but he knew it wasn’t good. Beelzebub was whispering something in her ear but it only seemed to make her angrier. “Why won’t you help me?” she asked, her words stiff and forced.

Mammon moved to her side, a hand on her shoulder and a hand going round to her other hip. If anyone was going to help her it would be him. He just had to get her to calm down first. 

“Get away!” she said and clung to the back of her chair as all three demons tried to pull her in different directions.

“You heard ‘er. Leave ‘er alone, you two,” Mammon said. 

At the sound of breaking glass, he shifted into his demon form, trying to shelter her with his wings. It sounded like it was falling from everywhere.

“Fine!” she said, over the cascading tinkle of imaginary glass and the groan of bending metal. 

“I’d let go if I were you,” Satan said from behind him, over the cacophony.

That couldn’t be good.

“Bith a bhi na m' bhia,” she said, and her knuckles were white from her grip around the back of the chair. “Winds and Forces of open spaces, hear me!”

Beelzebub sprang away just as wind began to circle round the entire room. “Mammon let go, she doesn’t have enough control!”

“All right. All right!” Mammon said. He let go of her and glanced back over his shoulder to see that Leviathan had already pulled himself upright. Beelzebub’s warning was unnecessary. It was practically an unspoken rule in the household. She wasn’t dangerous because of her meagre power; she was dangerous because it never did what it was supposed to.

“Come here and I’ll forgive you,” she shouted to the spirit bobbing and weaving around the light fixtures above. Both feet now balanced on the chair, she reached one hand up, trying to touch the mischievous messenger spirit as it dipped low. “I’m sure you thought your prank was funny but you’re taking it too far now. Come down.”

Mammon eyed Satan, and watched as he drank down the last of his mug: the green light around him sputtered and he covered his mouth with his sleeve, choking on laughter and tea. Eyes closed, Satan pointed the interior of the cup at Mammon to reveal a tiny, ceramic hand flipping him off at the very bottom of the vessel.

Of course she would give him a present like that. 

It seemed as though she was calming down. The mal’akh was inching closer. 

Thankfully, Lucifer hadn’t stepped in again. Mammon wasn’t entirely sure how their argument had ended other than that an oath was made, but it wasn’t often that his mistress viewed magic contracts the same way they did. Belphegor’s pact with her hadn’t counted as a life for a life in her eyes; an oath from Lucifer was just as unlikely to make her feel respected or safe. One wrong word from Lucifer here could set off a chain reaction.

A camera flash went off. At least Asmodeus was having a good time. The reaction pictures he was taking would inevitably end up on Devilgram.

Mammon scrubbed at his face and readying himself to collect either her, the mal'akh, or both. She was going to be absolutely drained after this if yesterday’s musical contest was anything to go by. Neither Satan nor Lucifer were known for their timidity and restraint when it came to magic or curiosity. It was unlikely she’d rested properly in days.

The tinkling of glass finally gone, Mammon retracted his wings and looked up to find his mistress a finger’s breadth from reaching her goal. Beelzebub stood a respectful distance away and could have easily reached Publedina, but he didn’t move. Very strange. She hadn’t _specifically_ said she didn’t want help, only that she didn’t want them crowding her. In fact, she’d asked why he wasn’t helping. Why wasn’t Beelzebub taking advantage of that? More importantly, why was Belphegor looking anywhere but at what was going on? Beelzebub hadn’t edged backward until he’d heard the glass.

Warm, meandering humming came from the messenger who immediately darted away. It reminded Mammon of the thermal columns that would let him fly for hours without a single flap of his wings. The soft voice was soothing, but it had the opposite effect on his human. Her shoulders hunched, she began to shake, clinging to the chair now for something other than balance.

“Just you wait until I get a hold of you.” She practically growled the words. “Moihernee won't be able to save you! Come here, right now, or you'll think the fucked up way Rageorapper reassembled Oonah was a blessing!” 

Mammon took to the air at the exact moment he heard her begin to chant. He did not want to accidentally become a platypus, and her aim was indiscriminate.

“May we be drawn together and bound together,” she said, anger and fear echoing in the sounds around them, “by a force none can resist and none can esc—”

“That is quite enough,” Lucifer said calmly, her outstretched arm caught in his hand at the wrist, and Publedina grasped firmly in his other gloved hand, held over his head. 

Mammon breathed a silent sigh of relief. The only person worse than himself with curses and hexes was his mistress. Everything she shot off went off target or had wildly different results than intended. His regret at his relief was nearly instantaneous; it seemed as though all of the fire in her guttered out. Mammon folded his wings and dropped back to his place at her side.

“Are you going to kill me?” she asked, her voice quiet, but even, as she stepped down off the chair. She leaned her hip against the side of the table, angling her body away from her captor. The room was silent as the grave.

Lucifer’s hold left the soft interior of her arm stretched out in front of Beelzebub, who was staring daggers into the side of Lucifer’s face.

This was not going to end well. Moving slowly, Mammon touched her back once more. She needed to know he was there, even if she couldn’t see him.

“That would defeat the purpose of the exchange program,” Lucifer said, “and—”

“Then get your fucking hands off of me!” she snarled.

Even Beelzebub rocked back on his feet at her exclamation.

“Do **not** interrupt me,” Lucifer said sharply, before moving his other arm in front of himself to ward off the blow she aimed toward him.

It was only a split second, but Mammon saw the glint of metal, and his arm covered hers before he could think. He waited for the point to strike, but it never came. Instead, Beelzebub’s hand was over his as well, only a fraction of a second slower. The serrated blade didn’t leave a scratch on him.

It had never been aimed at Lucifer, but the look of shock on his face pierced Mammon in a way the steak knife never could have. _She knew._ It was a dicey gamble if she hadn’t known, but she’d bet that her pain would result in Lucifer’s, testing his weakness with her own.

Lucifer released her hand and stared pointedly at Belphegor, who was now standing on the table, looking down on them all. “I have broken the link between the two of them,” Lucifer said cooly. “That will be all.”

For a moment, no one moved, and then all hell broke loose as they turned on one another for not aiding her, or not being fast enough. Mammon could hear Leviathan complaining about Asmodeus not letting him go.

Still atop the table, Belphegor collected her from between them, scooping her up in a combination of tail and arms, to deposit her somewhere safer, and Mammon cursed his timing; the moment she was out of range Beelzebub rounded on Lucifer and Little Demons of all shapes and sizes poured out of the woodwork to air their grievances with one another as well. 

He felt the silencing spell go up and, not for the last time, cursed the need to keep up appearances too. The last thing his human needed was more silencing spells.

“I told you not to touch her!” Beelzebub shouted as he transformed. “I’m sure we all have by now!” 

Grabbing Beelzebub by the back of his leather jacket, Mammon kept him from actually making contact with Lucifer, and he glanced over his shoulder to find their human tucked against Belphegor’s side. Mammon wanted to turn him inside out. That was the last place she should be. 

“If you could keep your mistress in check it wouldn’t be a problem,” Lucifer said, his words far too even to be anything but inflammatory. 

“You’re the oldest of us! How's it my problem that you can’t keep yourself in check?”

Lucifer could swat him like a fly but he didn’t say anything. His expression spoke volumes: this is idiotic. 

“Whoooa! Watch out!” Mammon said, and knocked a candlestick out of the air before it struck Lucifer or Beelzebub. The entire dining room was in an uproar, with Little Demons tumbling across the floor grappling with one another, while others bet on the outcome. Some had begun to throw cutlery, and still others were dropping their brethren from above to land on the unwary below.

“Is it just me, or is this really getting out of hand?” Asmodeus shouted across the table. He used both hands around a platter to swat a Little Demon away from his face.

Their mistress’ voice was pitchy with apprehension. “Someone stop this!”

Satan piped up from a few feet behind Mammon, he was clearly answering their mistress. “Once Beel gets like this, the only way to pacify him is by giving him food...honestly, it's high time Beel learned some patience. Which is why—” A loud thud followed by an “Urph…” was the last Mammon heard as he tried to wedge an arm between the chests of his taller brethren.

“Wooow...Whoever threw that plate of pancakes just scored a critical hit to Satan's face,” Asmodeus said.

That could only mean bad things were about to happen. Very bad things.

“You…” Satan began. He transformed and let his power creep over the inhabitants of the room. “How **dare** you throw something at me!”

Lucifer finally looked away from Beelzebub. “Satan, calm down.”

“Shut the hell up!”

“What did you say?” Lucifer asked and disengaged from his previous posturing.

‘Out of the frying pan and into the fire,’ Mammon thought. They were going to have to evacuate the Little Demons and their mistress if they were going to survive an actual spat between father and son.

“What the…” Asmodeus asked. “Mammon! Don't you throw plates at me!”

“That wasn't me!” Mammon shouted back, once more scanning the room for his human. “It was one of the Little D’s!” 

Belphegor didn’t have her, and his tail was twitching angrily. “Asmo, what're you doing? That cookie you threw hit me right in the forehead!”

“Well it was your fault for being in the line of fire, wasn't it?” Asmodeus shouted back.

The situation was getting more and more chaotic by the second.

“All of you... **STOP IT!** ” she shouted.

Mammon caught sight of her just before he yelped and slammed chest first into the floor. Her fists had been balled tightly at her sides and she was half turned to hide against Leviathan, who was trying to blend in with the wall despite how red he’d turned.

Everything hurt. It felt like Lucifer was standing on him and increasing the gravity a hundred fold. It felt like his pelvis was going to crack with how it was pressing into the floor. A sliver of panic shot through him as he heard the large bone mass creak. “Wh-What's goin' on?” Mammon asked.

At first, the only answer from around him was a terrible groan from Beelzebub.

“It's the power of the pact…” Satan finally said, puffing with exertion to get the words out. “The power of a master to immobilize a demon.”

Mammon rested his cheek back on the floor and listened to the smattering of tiny, clawed hands applauding. Lucifer’s polished shoes were still firmly on the floor where they should be, only the minute fluttering of his pant leg gave away that he might possibly be affected.

“Hold on, are the Little D’s actually clapping now?” Belphegor asked, not bothering to lift his head to look.

Beelzebub groaned again, clearly straining against the force holding them down. “Can’t move...at all.”

“Wh-Stop it! Don't applaud. HELP us!” Asmodeus squawked at his minions.

Still, Lucifer said nothing. Was he as shocked as they were? Was he not yet recovered from her attempt to harm him through herself? His silence in itself could be a weapon. At least he hadn’t picked her up to reinstate his authority.

The clapping stopped abruptly and Mammon attempted to look in the direction of his mistress, even if all he could now see was her sock covered feet.

“Lucifer and I **will** be getting along,” she said, authority ringing out loud enough to hide any of the anger Mammon was listening for, “ **without touching.** ”

There was a pause before she continued and Mammon could only imagine that she was giving Lucifer the evil eye until he agreed with her. If he didn’t, there were six demons happy to roast him on a spit for a day or two, no matter the retribution afterwards. Once they could move again.

“None of you will be fighting with one another anymore:” she said, “no violence, no name calling, no trickery, no revenge! You’ve all lost the privilege of deciding that for yourselves. I’m done.”

Mammon could imagine her from the knees up, hands on her hips, surveying them all as Leviathan hid behind her. 

“Little D’s don’t think I’m not looking at you too. If your lords have to abide by those rules, I expect them to make you beholden to them as well.”

A heavy sigh from Belphegor was her only reply beyond the squeaks and hissing Infernal of the Little Demons.

“Excellent.”

Mammon knew what she meant when she said 'Excellent.’ It was her 'that’s what I thought,’ when she was trying not to be too obviously smug. His face felt hot. He wanted to stay on the floor.

“There will be a mandatory meeting in the second parlor at ten o’clock. Lucifer, your presence is not required, but it is requested,” she said formally.

Still, silence. Mammon didn’t know what to make of it. 

“I’m going to my room and will take the rest of my breakfast there. Good morning, gentlemen. **You will not be late.** ” She left hastily, with Leviathan at her heels.

Did that mean she was still angry with them? What was the meeting about?

He must’ve fallen harder than he’d thought; until he tried to roll over, he hadn’t even noticed that Beelzebub lay atop the broken table. Managing to sit up, he looked over his kingdom to find Little Demons sweeping debris into dustpans. Belphegor, from what could be seen of him under the table legs, would not be getting up any time soon.

For many long minutes, there was no break in the quiet and embarrassing affair of rising. Groans and panting were ignored as the Little Demons cleaned up their mess. Leviathan’s brief return to fill a plate before rushing out of the room was the only interruption. He’d paused for a moment before darting around the room to fulfill his orders; Lucifer had caught his attention, leg crossed over his knee, sitting in his chair, eating with his bowl in hand as if nothing had happened. 

Satan, still seated on the floor, coughed into his fist, his other arm draped limply over one of his bent knees. “As much as this feels like we’ve been through the semi-annual physical,” he said, “you have to admit it’s impressive how much she’s grown this week alone.”

Mammon lay back down and closed his eyes. That was what scared him the most.


End file.
